Peter and the Wolves
by bunyipbabe
Summary: The universe is a big, big place. Even bigger when you're a young Terran who suddenly has to find your own way in it. Peter, Kraglin and Yondu are sent running to opposite ends of the galaxy. Hunted by enemies and encountering characters old and new, it's going to be one long and ugly scramble if they want to come out alive.
1. Chapter 1

**In which Yondu's an a-hole, Kraglin's had enough, and Peter is being ignored.**

 **You may notice that 'Major Character Death' isn't included in the tags. So please do keep reading after the first paragraph. ;)**

* * *

It started with a bang.

More a boom, to be precise. And what a boom – it was an epiglottal consonant from a cosmic tongue: a sub-bass throb that was felt as much as it was heard. At least, that was how it seemed to Peter, who watched in nauseous slow motion as the plasma bolt erupted from Yondu's skull.

* * *

 _Rewind._

* * *

"And if I see your sorry ass on Bridge before I say so, I'mma let Horuz _eat you!_ " The slam of the door in Quill's face was all kinds of satisfying. The pain when Yondu proceeded to kick it as hard as he could was less so – "Ow! Fuck, fuck, fuck –"

"Y'know sir?" said Kraglin, lounging on the bed with a holopad fanned out in front of his nose. "The guide says when you're disciplining kids you're supposed to keep your cool."

"The guide, the guide…" Yondu stopped hopping around long enough to pin his first mate with an ugly glower. "Where'd you even get that thing?"

"Stole it." Of course. Yondu waved him off.

"Anyhow, that thing-a-me's written about Xandarian brats. Says so right on the cover. Doesn't apply to… To… Whatever Quill is."

"Well maybe if you'd asked his daddy what he was when you was taking this job in the first place – or, I dunno, _dropped the kid off like you said you would_ – we wouldn't be in this mess?"

Yondu was tired. And his toe hurt. Those were the only reasons why his first mate didn't have arrow fletching instead of a nose. He still smacked the back of his head as he marched to the chair, foot twinging every step – that was the damn kid's fault too, of course – and straddled it, slumping moodily over the backrest. "Fuck off. What's got you so snippy, anyway?"

Kraglin lowered the pad, a drawbridge of plastic, glass, and shifting pixels. He actually managed to meet Yondu's glare for a full five seconds, which was a damn good count for him. "You really need me to say it?"

"Nah, I want you to say it." Because Yondu knew what this was about. It was written as plain as the jagged constellations that marked out their course. Kraglin was squirming tight around some critter that had crawled up his tailpipe and croaked circa eleven o'clock three nights ago, and said critter was approximately six-seven, muscled like a high-grav dweller, very eager to please, and went by the name of _Axley_.

Yondu yawned and scratched his nose. "You don't give two shits when I fuck Chroma."

"Chroma's got something I ain't!"

"A sense of humour?"

"Fuck off." It only took the duration of a blink for Kraglin to remember himself. Then he scowled – murderously but not mutinously, never that. "Fuck off, sir."

"Thas better." Yondu paused. "Although, seeing as it's my room –"

"Yeah, yeah." Kraglin rose from his side of the bed with a sneer that could curdle any liquid under fifty percent proof – Yondu's blood, being eighty on a good night, suffered no worse for wear. He slammed his heels into his boots hard enough to make the interlocking grid of palm-coded drawer boxes set into the walls rattle, yanking his jacket over shoulders held high and stiff. He didn't spare Yondu another glance.

"Planetside first thing," Yondu reminded him, spinning the chair from foot to foot. He didn't look at Kraglin either, as his first mate sauntered off, hands shoved into his pockets far enough to tickle his knees and dragging with him those familiar smells of hair grease and solvent knife-polish. The door bolted behind him with a definitive click.

Yondu span an aimless moment longer. He stood, twisting the kink from his spine, and kicked off his boots to assess the damage to his toe (minimal – boy didn't need to die after all); before announcing a heartfelt "Whatever!" to any interstellar entities that might be judging, and collapsing on his empty bed.

* * *

"Hey."

A tug on his collar. Kraglin twisted to follow it, drink slopping, and discovered, in order: a small pink hand almost obscured by the pushed-up red leather sleeve, a set of drooping shoulders, and a pudgy freckled face, expression caught between anger and misery as if its owner had been vacillating too fast and jammed it there. "You ignoring me too?" asked Peter. The haughty tone was belied by the sniff.

Usually, Kraglin'd let his response – or lack thereof – serve as answer. But what the hell. He wasn't following Yondu's lead. Not that night.

Galleon was orbiting Knowhere. Frigates thrumming in the aether behind, the silent rumble of their engines a warning to any who dared make landfall that night. Crew had wheedled themselves a rare twenty-four hours of port leave between jobs. Lenient, as Yondu went – but things'd been tense ever since he declared they were reneging on the biggest prize of the decade, and refused to be swayed by any of Kraglin's increasingly desperate suggestions, warnings, and pleas to the contrary. Heck, their comms officer'd reported mutterings of mutiny over the midnight feeds. And while there were always whispers and there always would be, _mutterings_ were of a different nature entirely.

(Being the one who'd first upset tradition by deposing-slash-disposing of his predecessor, Yondu couldn't exactly call 'em hypocrites; but that didn't mean it didn't rankle. C'mon. He was no _Dagada_.)

Comms crew themselves, being the busy little bees they were, had spurned the proposition of a holiday and gotten right on with relay-repairs, making the most of Knowhere's overflowing black market tech stalls. Kraglin'd heard rumours that The Crab's crew had set up shop down in the rotten roots of the Celestial's canines. And while there was, perhaps, a scant smidgeon of animosity between their captains (more of a _misunderstanding,_ really) so long as the two weren't left in an enclosed space with no witnesses, everyone should survive. The Ravagers might even get a new comms rig out of it – albeit one charged at a steeper price than they'd find outside of Novaspace.

But hey. You wanted the best, you got the best. Like the comms crew – they'd been Ravagers since before Dagada's time, and were sure enough of themselves to refuse Kraglin's not-especially-heartfelt offer of negotiation assistance. Thus, rather than twenty-four hours spent playing civil with the guy who wanted his captain's head on a platter (and entertaining notions of serving it up for him) Kraglin had twenty-four hours of relative freedom in which to get himself drunk. Preferably, drunk enough to forget that Yondu'd gotten bored during the graveyard shift and decided that some snivelling underdecker with an authority fetish was worthy of his cock.

Or his ass. He hadn't asked – wasn't sure he wanted to know the answer. Yondu'd only laugh and say whichever would nark Kraglin off the most.

Jackass.

"You're ignoring me," Peter decided, dropping his lapel and stepping back. "It's okay. I don't like you guys much anyway."

Kraglin huffed. "He ain't _ignoring_ you. He's trying to pretend you don't exist so he doesn't knock you into a vat of spinal fluid next time you piss him off."

Peter, without waiting for permission, hopped onto the stool besides him and slumped dramatically over the bar. "I didn't do anything though!" Kraglin's stare, even blood-bloated with alcohol, still managed to be as arid as the Morag wastes. Peter relented. "Much. But heck. It was just a bunch of them little baubles – and they only got halfmelted… Why's he like them so much, anyway?"

That was a question not even Kraglin could answer. Maybe _Axley_ would have better luck. "Who knows," he grunted, slurping a noisy mouthful. "Captain's a weird one, alright."

"Hm." Peter didn't disagree. Just… watched him, his big dumb Terran eyes oddly nervous as they followed Kraglin's moody sips, glass-green liquor fumes curling up towards the first mate's nostrils on the inhale. Kraglin, mildly self-conscious at the best of times, tugged his collar higher over his chin and glared.

"What."

"He mad at you, too?"

" _What?_ No!" Kraglin snarled without meaning to; his teeth clicked on the glass's rim when he tossed the tumbler back. His voice cracked harsh as he wiped his mouth and stood to leave. "I'm mad at him."

The spirits burnt all the way down, and Peter knew better than to follow.

* * *

 **Tell me what you think! Even if it's just a word~ :3**

 **For everyone who follows my Ravager series on AO3: this is set after BIOTS but diverges from the first chapter of TRGTGL/The One With The Hostile Takeover/What Doesn't Kill You. You don't need to read BIOTS first, as it just gets us to the point where Yondu's captain and Kraglin first mate. But you might miss out on a couple of everyone who hasn't read 'Jealousy' – Chroma's a prostitute. She's awesome.**


	2. Chapter 2

**In which Peter makes a friend.**

* * *

Peter watched the residue bead around the lip of Kraglin's glass, and wondered if there were laws against this sort of thing. Although – what was it Yondu said? _Only rules Ravagers live by is the ones we make ourselves_. So Peter stood, caught the barman's eye, fished a credit chit out of his pocket, and said, in his deepest voice: "One of what he had, good sir."

The barman was a guy of a size with Thrabba, minus the mechanical eye and plus a sturdy white cone propped on his collarbones. The neck beneath looked too thin to support the head, which was presented at the circle's centre like a nipple on a breast. It jiggled about with the force of his scoff. "Not likely, kid. You think I want Ravagers on my ass for givin' their pet alcohol poisoning?"

Peter decided to waive the 'pet' comment. He'd been called worse, all things considered. "I can handle it!"

The barman raised an eyebrow and resumed cleaning his glass. "Yeah, yeah. Come back in ten years."

Alright. The man didn't want his custom? His loss. Peter pocketed the chip, mouth not quite mastering the fine difference between a scowl and a pout, and flipped the bartender off before marching away. At least, that's what he intended to do. The weight of a hand on his shoulder prevented him, as another gently folded the up-pronged middle finger down. It was pale, delicate, feminine. Each nail had been filed to a talon, and painted an incongruous pastel pink.

"Two for me, bud," said Vaas. She squeezed Peter's hand until the claws dug in. "If the boss gives you trouble, he'll have to go through me."

Peter turned to discover the rest of the comms crew, standing in a loose arc. There were seven of them, all shapes and sizes from across the galaxy. They ranged from Neets, a short and corpulent pug-faced creature from the Outworlds, to Drabor, a lumpy-necked Kronan who would dwarf Peter if he stood on Kraglin's shoulders and who was forever banging his head on low-flying doorways. They looked naked without their headsets; it was a surprise to see that some bothered to cultivate hair. Vaas was not among them – her shaved skull glinted weirdly under the dull purple bar lamps, the angular slope of her crown tossing the light back at itself. Heck, with that haircut and those nails, she looked almost as badass as _Yondu._ Although she wasn't too big an a-hole to hang out with him.

Peter grinned. "I can pay you back!" He sat when Vaas shunted the stool out with her boot, and caught the glass as it came skidding down the bartop, the barman recorking the bottle in between pours for a surly shake. But when he fished out his credit-purse, the Comms Officer shook her head, smile small and sharp.

"No worries."

Peter's eyes bugged. "For real?" Yondu never gave him freebies. He _pretended_ he gave him freebies, but in actuality it was always 'do this, do that, and I'll do this for you then hold it against you whenever you bitch about getting bog-duty after Horuz's been through; because I coulda let my boys eat you, y'know'. This was new territory, uncharted and exciting. Peter had only been a Ravager three weeks, and while yeah, it was kinda cool hanging out with a bunch of fearsome space pirates, his mom's hoarse lectures on _positive influences_ weighed on him like a lead lifejacket. If Vaas and her crew bought him drinks without demanding any nefarious or grimy means of compensation, didn't that make them a fair sight more decent than the average Ravager?

Peter's hopes were dampened when Vaas scrumpled his hair, nails scratching lightly on his scalp. "Not in money, anyways. I got me a job you could help me out with, if you wanna earn your keep." She grabbed her glass, nodding thanks to the barman, and took a stone-faced pull. Peter, who couldn't sip without choking and tearing up, watched in envy and not a little respect.

"You want me to nick something?" he hazarded. Yondu'd been trying to teach him, in between doing captain-y stuff. And while he maintained that scrubbing decks was the most promising of Peter's future careers he _had_ seemed pleased that one time Peter'd managed to steal his Walkman out of his pocket without him noticing.

It had, to be fair, been mostly down to luck – luck and a well-placed bottle of Kalzalorian moonshine. Peter had pleaded for his missing satchel to no avail after he'd woken shivering, dripping with fluorescent delousing gel and boasting a pair of stinging scars: one behind his ear and another on the side of his throat, entry points of cochlea and vocal translators. He'd given up hope of seeing his mum's mixtape again, figuring it'd been jettisoned as garbage, and almost succumbed to panic when he was singing himself to sleep and couldn't remember the third verse to _Fooled Around And Fell In Love_. Then he'd caught Kraglin on the Navdeck, humming Ooh Child as he span them through space at the galaxy's edge. A pulsing quasar had been the only entity for kliks in either direction, and Peter had almost sent them careering into it when he'd tackled the first mate around his bony knees. He'd even managed to get in a punch while Kraglin was too shocked to retaliate, Isla scrambling for the abandoned holodeck post and Yondu guffawing obnoxiously loud in the background.

After that Peter'd been on the lookout. When he'd spotted the puffy orange pad of a speaker hanging from Yondu's pocket, he'd decided to put his lessons to good use. Yondu had been kind enough to comply, snatching the bait as soon as Peter offered it and proceeding to pass out snoring in his chair before the empty bottle hit the floor. He hadn't even eaten Peter in vengeance the next day – although he had threatened.

Now the Walkman was clipped securely to Peter's belt, and he'd determined that it was never leaving it. Music played on quiet; the headphones round his neck emitted a tinny rendition of Moonage Daydream as Vaas drained the last of the pungent draught and let steam curl from her nostrils. Peter leant over the bartop, opting to nurse his drink in the hopes the brew would weaken once the vapour had dispersed, and tried to look menacing. "I'm a good thief."

Vaas' tattooed eyebrows met in the middle of her forehead. When they rose, it looked like a double-arched rollercoaster. "Oh yeah? How about an actor?"

Peter considered. Rocked his highball from side to side, listening to the spirits slap. "I can lie…?" Because wasn't that the same thing?

Vaas nodded. "Good enough. Finish up and come along."

* * *

"What d'you mean, you _left him in the bar_? Ya don't leave him in a bar! Heck, Kraglin. Kid could find trouble in a Xandarian kindergarten. He's probably asking a Kymellian if he's hung like a horse right about now."

Yondu stomped down the gangway. He barged a trio of Ravagers out the way as he addressed his scowl to the sullen face blooming from the holo-gem on his wristpiece. Trembling under the weight of a metre-squared slab of Kree hull plating – illegal in Nova airspace, twice as tough as anything outside of the Chitauri homeworld and with a finish that smelt oddly of tangerines – their knees buckled inwards, and promptly gave out. The chasm of Knowhere's main port gaped: a serrated cliff-face of dense-packed walkways, vertical docking bays and cargo conveyers hewn into the enamel of the Celestial's incisors. They were saved from teetering into it by Yondu, who grabbed the edge of the plate without looking and hauled them upright – " _Careful_ with that; you know what that sells for on the black market? You wanna go base-jumping, you drop my stock in hold first. Gottit?"

A mumbled chorus of yessirs.

Yondu rolled his eyes and turned his anger to where it was needed. "As for you – you better make this right. The fuck were you thinking?"

* * *

Now, Kraglin was no master at information extraction. He left that job to Horuz, who had been dropped on his head too often as a child and was devoid of empathy, respect for authority, and qualms about torture alike; or to Morlug, whose chewed-up face had an interesting way of making wimpier folks squeal without her having to lay a finger on them. In comparison to their well-practiced and subtle techniques – or, in the case of Horuz, his artfully amateurish wielding of a pair of pliers – Kraglin, when faced with a situation where knowledge was needed and the bearer uncooperative, usually relied on a namedrop of his captain. When that didn't work, a reminder of that classic Hraxian spine-pulling trick did the job. Or a knife brought into friendly proximity with an eyeball. And thus he made his way around the bar, isolating the body part with the highest ratio of nerve endings to squishiness on every Hordesmen, Ravagers, and off-duty Corpsmen that he pinned to the wall, as he spat his question through gritted teeth:

"Where's the kid?"

"The what?"

Kraglin's knife scratched the flared flap of the A'askavarian's nostril. It quivered around the tip of the blade. "Don't be fuckin' cute, I ain't got the patience. Kid. Now."

Suffice to say, Yondu hadn't been pleased when he'd found out that Kraglin had been the last one to see the brat. Or that he'd stormed off and left said brat to fend for itself in the middle of a grubby Knowhere dive populated by bounty hunters, scavengers, smugglers, outlaws, and other such assorted rapscallions. Kraglin had the distinct memory of "The fuck were you _thinking_?", of replying with an un-thought out "The fuck do you care?" and facing a whole minute of stony silence before a soft whistle had him dashing for the bar.

Yeah, it was over the comms. And _yeah_ , Yondu's range wasn't _that_ good. Whatever.

So here he was. Patching his mistake. Growing more irritated with every evasive mumble and shrug. Wondering which one he'd strangle first, once he'd achieved his objective: the brat for getting himself into this, or his unwanted companion.

Yondu's sense of humour was more sadistic than Kraglin had assumed. Or else he'd already tired of his big, despicably handsome puppy – whatever the reason, he'd ordered Axley to be his first mate's back up. The two of them had picked their way methodically around the bar with Kraglin's glare leaving his present interrogation victim only to bore into Axley's back, and Axley ignoring him with a determination that was as valiant as it was futile.

Kraglin didn't like him.

For all his unbroken nose, full set of teeth, and four functioning bonny blue eyes (damn him), Axley was still a Ravager, and Kraglin wouldn't put it past any Ravager to set something like this up if they were after a bite at being top dog. (Second top dog. Top dog who occasionally got to top toppermost dog.) For all he knew, Axley had Peter stowed on his M-ship and was waiting for him to drop his guard so he could sneak off and retrieve him and claim all the glory… Well, Kraglin was gonna pluck thatastrochicken before it flew the coop. No way was Axley getting out of his sight –

"Yeah, I saw 'im," said the barman, stoically unperturbed by Kraglin's grip of the cone that held his wizened neck straight. He continued polishing his glasses as Kraglin, crouched like a bony and particularly malignant gargoyle atop the counter, bared his piranha-like teeth and clacked them loud enough to make Axley – on the other side of the room and pretending not to be eavesdropping – jump.

"Gonna need more than that, friend," he growled. The barman's cloth made another squeaking revolution. He lifted the tumbler, blew away an invisible speck, spat, and wiped again. Looked Kraglin placidly in the eye.

"Left with one o'yours. Tall lass, shaved head. Skinny like you, with the same set o'chompers. Dunno where they went."

Kraglin relaxed. Marginally. At least it was a Ravager – not that he'd really thought Peter stupid enough to wander off with a Hordesman (or worse, a Nova Officer) but by now he'd learnt not to write anything off where that pest was concerned. Far more trouble than he was worth. If only Yondu'd handed him over to his papa like he wassupposed to…

He relaxed his grip on the barman's collar, enough to let the plastic remould to its original shape. "Gimme a direction," he said. The barman flapped his rag at the eastern exit. Kraglin nodded. Jumped off the bar, and whistled sharply for Axley. "Oi, idiot! Heel!"

* * *

"So what's it you want me to do?" Peter asked. His chest was all warm and fuzzy, and he could taste liquor in the back of his throat. If felt as if the fumes were curling from his gut and clogging his sinuses; an intoxicating miasma that slid fingers into the cracks in his mind and whispered that he could conquer the whole galaxy, if he only tried. His fists tightened into hard little knots. "Lie? Who to?"

"All in good time!" Vaas grinned, ruffling his hair again with no care for Peter's wince. It was bad enough when Yondu did that. At least he didn't have claws.

The Ravager comms crew had formed a ragtag circle, protecting him from the buffet of pickpockets and worse. Peter's vision of the passing tunnel was blotted by the pendulum-swing of their blurry red legs. Everything looked a little melty around the edges, as if there were multiple images overlaid. Peter examined his hands with gleeful curiosity. Was this what it was like to be drunk? To be an adult?

From what he could make out, they were walking through one of Knowhere's interior corridors: a hollowed vein whose walls had atrophied to porous stone. The roof was stitched with fat plastic tubes which siphoned spinal fluid uphill from the vats by the Celestial's exposed cervical vertebrae via a system of plungers and valves. Exhaust flues wobbled heat-haze at the tunnel's edge, and the lights that'd been crudely patched into the spongey, calcified tissue hummed dim. There were squatters and mod-addicts crouched with their backs to the walls, warming their hands over the vents and shuffling to the side when they heard the warning rattle that foretold of a blast of superheated air. Eyes of all types – cycloptic, compound, mechanical; anthropoid and arthropod – averted from their passage, then swivelled to appraise the dark red backs once they'd passed. Peter, for all his liquid courage, shivered and pressed a little closer to Vaas' side.

"What're they looking at?" he whispered. Vaas' smile was a needle-toothed tease.

"Probably wanna eat ya."

Peter scowled. "Why does everyone keep _saying_ that?"

"Cause you make that face whenever we do."

Peter attempted to correct the face in question, but only succeeded in exaggerating it. Vaas chuckled and patted him on the cheek, nail scraping a curl of skin from his temple – by accident, he was sure. "Alright. We're nearly there. Now listen close, because we only get one shot. And remember – it's all a joke, yeah?"

* * *

 **Yeah I just wanted to introduced Vaas. Vaas the ass. STOP SCRATCHING PETER**

 **Want to know what a Kymellian is? Google it. ;) Marvel's answer to furries.**

 **Please review!**


	3. Chapter 3

**In which Yondu parts with thirteen credits, and Peter teaches Vaas how to pinky-swear.**

* * *

Yondu wasn't 'pissed', because you didn't get pissed about things you didn't care about. Yondu was 'mildly aggravated' that Quill hadn't buzzed home to mention he and Vaas were taking a roadtrip, and even more mildly aggravated that Kraglin had let him. Didn't he know that if Yondu was ignoring the kid to make a point, then that made him Kraglin's duty? It was practically his job description: _always have your captain's back._ Or, in this case, his Terran.

"Can't handle one damn thing," he griped as he strode down the alley, earning nervous stares from the scummy assembly of streetrats on their way to count the day's spoils. "Heck knows why I keep that idiot around –"

One scamp, either new to the streets or blessed with an inverted survival instinct, made a messy scrabble for his pocket. A grapple with an oily-feeling jerkin and a pair of emaciated arms soon halted that, and Yondu shook the little thief until the ten-piece credit chit she'd snatched slipped from her fingers and rattled into the clogged and stinking drainpipe. "Aw, _seriously_?" Yeah, it had only been one chit; and if the kid was willing to risk limbs for it, the coin's loss would be considerably harder on her. But money was money. And Yondu liked money. Just as he didn't like annoying little brats who had the gumption to steal from him – like a certain Terran.

Although to be fair, Quill'd conked him out with moonshine first. At least this kid stole face-to-face.

Taking a quick peek behind to scope the alleys for loitering crew, Yondu gave the kid a sharp flick to her ear rather than the boot to the gut that was expected. "Alright. Poor choice of pocket. Now fuck off and find someone nicer to rob."

She grabbed his wrist.

Yondu stopped, more out of shock than as a result of any exerted force. Then considered what any out-of-sight watcher might be seeing, and snarled, yanking away. "You're a bit small for a mugger, brat. Now fuck off, before I _make you_." A twitch of his trenchcoat revealed the arrowtip. It glimmered as the kid watched, red specks reflected in the pox-crusted whites of her eyes.

"I saw him," she rasped. "I saw your Terran, I did."

Yondu considered. Kraglin had given him the description of Peter's current chaperone – Vaas. Good girl, bit bony for his taste; had a weird sense of humour and that involved pumping awful Hraxian club music over the intercom while he was on his nightshift then claiming it was accidental when questioned. He'd been planning on comming her to get a location, but –

"Where?" he asked. Anybody could be paid off to lead you into an ambush, and Yondu trusted these snot-nosed Knowhere wastrels approximately a tenth of the distance he could throw them. Although, if the Horde were looking to ambush him on _Knowhere_ of all places, they must be as daft as the Collector tasteless. There wasn't a square inch of the Celestial's skull that Yondu hadn't utilized for some shady trade or another. He'd see a corner coming a mile off, and when he did… Well, he did a darn good impression of a trapped rat. Only with more whistles.

Kid snuffled. Messily wiped her nose, then held out the same hand.

Not a newbie after all. Yondu made a show of muttering as he scooped another three chits from his pocket and deposited them in the girl's palm. Couldn't be too generous, or he'd be pressed for more at every opportunity – by this one, and every other little critter that was peeping from the mouths of the tunnels gouged into the porous tissue above. The children of Knowhere were an unthought of commodity, in every market but espionage: in that, they excelled. News of this transaction would ripple out through a thousand whispers, passed behind a thousand tiny cupped hands. They'd have known Quill was missing before he did.

But Yondu couldn't do nothing about that. Tell 'em to scarper, another lot took their place – and the others'd run straight to the nearest Hoard schooner and blab that the Ravager captain was out on his lonesome. Not that Yondu couldn't handle whatever they threw at him, but this had taken too long already. His boys got antsy once a rest stop was over. That the source of the holdup was Quill wouldn't pass notice long. When they figured it out, Yondu'd be sauntering onto ship to face yet another long list of reasons why it was in the Ravagers' best interests to wrap Quill in parcel tape and dump him off at the nearest intergalactic postbox, stamped and addressed for Spartax.

So Yondu kept his stance relaxed and his eyes on the girl in front of him, and pulled out another chit, along with a string of lint. The lint was followed by several voluminous complaints, when she frowned and beckoned for more. They got to nine before the dynamic and vibrant imagery of his threats became too much for her to handle. She nodded. Held her spoils up to the light, and bit each metal disc: careful and precise, canine clamping the crimped edge. Then twizzled them onto the side unadorned with Nova Prime's profile, and blew. When her breath failed to condense – a sign of genuineness that only the best forgers could imitate – she treated Yondu to a grin that was as yellow as his and rather more gappy, and said, all in a rush – "He's chin-level. Bunker G140-Z."

Yondu nodded. "Right." Then grabbed her arm and tugged her in close while he prodded at the buttons of the wristpiece. If that location didn't match up, that meant there was someone gunning for him, and this girl would have the answer. "Hey, Vaas? Where are ya?" Only static. Stupid Celestial latent brainwaves or whatever, jamming the systems. Yondu shook the stupid thing – the kid reverberated as collateral – and tried again. "Vaas?"

Still static.

Yondu slowly released the call switch. You never had to hail Vaas twice. If it was electronic, that lass would make it sit up and beg. Heck, if Knowhere was having _wetdreams,_ it wouldn't register. "Kid?" he said.

The kid, who'd been moodily twisting her wrist in Yondu's fist, looked up. "What you want now?"

"When you say ya saw Quill… Who was he with?"

The kid hummed and rubbed her chin. Then opened and closed her captive hand. Another two chips were reluctantly parted with, and made their immediate passage between her remaining teeth.

"Bald chick," she said around the mouthful. "Bunch o'Ravager-reds, all shapes and sizes." Right. Vaas and her crew. He'd already figured that much. Yondu nodded along, motioning for her to expand.

"Anyone… else?"

Her smile turned sly – Yondu bristled on instinct, because like hell was he giving up more credits. But when the girl delivered her answer, his shoulders stiffened for an entirely different reason.

"Shit! You serious?"

"As there's twelve credits in my hand."

Yondu looked. There were eleven. He sighed and made it an even number.

"Yeah, I'm serious. Now, it were a pleasure doing business with ya, sir…" Yondu followed the pointed gaze down to where he was squeezing that half-starved twig of an arm. He released her, and found himself wondering if another little street rat had been this wily when he'd been running through the slums of Hrax – but shook the familiarity away before it could coalesce.

"Go on then. And if you're lying, you'll see me again."

"What?" the kid asked. "As a ghost?"

But she danced out of reach before Yondu could give her the kick she deserved.

* * *

Vaas dismissed Yondu's call icon with the click of a long pink nail. Then turned to Peter and treated him to a conspiratorial smirk. "Our secret?"

Peter grinned and held up a pinkie to hook through hers. "Our secret!"

Vaas considered the finger from every angle. Then hesitantly bumped her own against it. Peter laughed and showed her – "No, no! Like this! A pinkie-promise – it means you trust each other."

"Trust, huh?"

"Yeah! I used to do 'em with my mom. Before she, uh. Died. They say that if you break your word, your pinkie'll snap!"

Vaas narrowed dubious eyes at her finger, twined around Peter's smaller one and half-crooked so as not to scratch. "Really?"

That's what he loved about space. People were so… _different._ And silly, sometimes. Peter giggled. "No, not really. It's just a saying, y'know?" The brush of cool air as Vaas untangled her palm from his was oddly disappointing – Hraxian, like Kraglin: always burnt a few degrees hotter – and Peter shoved his hands into his pockets to chase the warmth.

"Just a saying," she repeated.

"Yeah."

"Good." She extended the digit and contracted it again, nail glistening like raw gristle. "I will need all of these, for what I'm about to do."

* * *

 _Meet me G tunnel now. Y._

Kraglin, in the process of clambering up the long steep incline that disgorged traffic from Knowhere's throat, swore and started heading back down.

"Couldn't message me five fuckin' minutes earlier, oh no, he's gotta wait until I'm almost at the ship. Jackass."

"What's going on?" Axley asked, trotting to keep up. Kraglin shouldered him away with a growl.

"You're getting as far away from me as you can, if you got any sense…"

A buzz from Axley's wristpiece.

 _You too._

Well, fuck it all.

"Kraglin?" called Isla from ahead. "Where you off to?"

Ignoring Axley, who was squinting at the elusive message as if his four blue eyes could charm out its secrets, Kraglin stood on his tiptoes and spotted the diminutive figure blending into the gaggle of redcoats who clustered the Celestial's wisdom teeth like germs in a decaying mouth. Which – well, they kinda were. The Ravagers had taken over this portion of the dock. The galleon crew had enjoyed their off-day in accordance to where they fell on the cycling work roster, and there'd been a steady in-and-out stream of M-ships since Yondu'd first declared the holiday forty-two hours back. Things were clanking up to operational speed again, as the last shift-set trudged to their stations.

Kraglin ought to be up there shouting at folks. Might make him feel a bit better too. But orders was orders.

"Sorry!" he hollered. "Go on without us! Captain's got another job!" He knew better than to mention what that 'job' was. Crew got mighty touchy about the Terran – mostly on behalf of the payday they'd missed out on and the questions it invited regarding their captain's susceptibility to _sentiment;_ partly because of said Terran himself.

Isla shot him a thumbs up, and turned to bawl at the pack of rookies under her command, telling them to look lively before she ground them up, dried them out, and sold them as packets of nutrient powder that fermented spinal fluid into fuel. Kraglin had to hide his grin. The scowl became infinitely more genuine when Axley tapped his shoulder.

"Uh. So. Where we going?"

With the big guy standing downhill, they were almost of a height. Kraglin folded his arms, hoisted his chin, and used every vantage that the thirty percent gradient gave him to loom in, forcing Axley to rock dangerously backwards. "We're going chin-level. And you are gonna stay right behind me, do everything I say, and not say a word. Got it?"

There was a long silence. Then – "What if you order me to talk?" May the cosmos preserve him. Kraglin examined him in scathing despair. What had Yondu been _thinking_ …?Axley's blink was quadruply guileless. "Uh, I got something on my face?"

On the plus side, he was too dumb to threaten his ranking. No matter how many abs he was packing beneath that stupid leather jacket – which everyone knew he'd stitched to be a size too small; it was so obvious, and why did he bother pretending otherwise?

Kraglin resettled on his heels, allowing Axley to level out at a position that was as gravitationally stable as possible while balancing on the incline of Knowhere's shrivelled tongue. Then barged past hard enough to make him windmill again.

"C'mon," he growled. "Let's get this over with."

* * *

 **Yondu is, as ever, a kind and loving guardian to children. Axley is a peach.**

 **Please review! x Gives me motivation.**


	4. Chapter 4

**In which Yondu does not know the meaning of patience and Kraglin does not know the meaning of haste.**

* * *

As tempting as it was to march in guns blazing – or arrow sizzling – and slay every last goon on the Crab's payroll, Yondu was all too aware of the qualms the old tech-guru had about killing kids. All zero of them. In fact, those qualms would delve into minus-numbers the moment Crab thought that harming Quill would hurt Yondu. Not that it _would,_ of course – but Yondu was still mad at the kid for using his favorite dashboard collectibles for target practice, and Quill wasn't allowed to die until he'd paid penance. And there was always Vaas' crew to consider. He _could_ promote a new outfit to the comms boards, vet 'em for access to the ship's internal feeds and train 'em up. But that would take _effort._ And after this omnishambles of a holiday, all Yondu wanted was to go to his cabin and conk out until he was next needed to shoot or yell at something. Might even bring Kraglin – but only if he showed up in the next five minutes.

Huffing, Yondu propped himself against the wall and set to slotting plasma-clips into the rifles. He'd nabbed them on the way, enlisting a small army of urchins to carry them, and now had an artillery that'd make a Kree Accuser weep spilt on the stained metal floor. Kraglin and Axley might want some extra armaments. And if they snuck a bunch to Vaas, the comms crew would cause enough of a ruckus that they all might get out alive.

Guns wren't half a lot of fuss though. How any species made it out the primordial soup without yaka, Yondu had no idea.

Here, in the burrows that wormed through Knowhere's yawning jaw, creatures of every shape and colour accumulated. They clogged the narrow market strips like fat in an artery, bartering over mod-extensions and memory chips, tuning their pistols and tinkering with the kick-activation on their jetboots. The dingy chill of the upper levels gave way: in its place came the geometric angles of a modder who'd integrated himself into his shopfront, the crackle of keyring soldering irons, the acrid stench of plasma eating through steel. This was the biggest underground tech hub skrullside of Betelgeuse. You could buy anything from Shi'ar surgical equipment to antique nukes – all for a steep price, unless you knew how to haggle.

The Crab was known to be worth the extra credits. Around the base of this Celestial root canal, a crowd pulsed that put the rest of the market to shame. The noise was a discordant hubbub, a background of whirs and grinds and mechanical clunks through which the occasional screech of honing metal pierced like fingernails scraping spaceglass, and there was a sour taste to the air, burnt plastic and ozone. Yondu could see the gates from here – two hewn chunks of plaque, carved with the Crab's insignia.

Apparently, Celestials hadn't been big on flossing. Not that he was one to judge.

It took a lot to arouse notice. A Ravager admiral muttering under his breath about idiot lag-about Hraxians and prepping enough light weaponry to kit a small platoon might just do the trick. But Yondu wasn't worried. He slammed the last crackling cartridge into the rifle's break-action, snapping shut the barrels with automatic ease. Let 'em know they were coming. Crab's lairs were always vaultlike; big, flashy, tough to crack. The scamp he'd collared had mentioned a crawlway through the ducts, but Yondu'd already drawn too much notice to bother with stealth. Only way he was getting in was via the front door, and there were enough scuttle-cams posted between here and there to announce his arrival long before he knocked.

So. Stand off. What came next? Crab'd conduct an interview – holographic on his part, 'cause heaven forbid that old geezer actually get his hands dirty. They'd posture and snark until they'd sussed terms. Then arrange a meet, exchange hostages for credits, and all would be on their way. No necessary casualties.

Only thing was, with a crew waiting on his orders to blast off, Yondu didn't have time or patience for _negotiation_. And Kraglin's five minutes were up.

A metal-on-metal chitter from above. Yondu looked up. Caught the arachnid jitter of a scuttle cam's legs as it backpedalled into the vent shaft. He flipped off its unblinking red eye. "Tell the Crab I wanna audience. Now."

* * *

Kraglin jogged into the hollowed core of the Celestial's chin, sweat gathering under his jacket. Upper Knowhere was cold and barren, but lower Knowhere was muggy, and the chemical brews churned out by the cold-construction tech factories left a pollutant stain on the mist. Kraglin smacked his lips. Just like home. This bit even looked like Hrax, what with all the street children. One of whom sauntered over and popped to a brazen salute.

"You the Ravager mate?"

Axley thundered up behind him, puffing, as Kraglin narrowed his eyes. "Who's asking?"

"The girl with a present from your boss."

"Kraglin – that passage you told me was a shortcut – led me up to the brain centre – almost got shot by one of the Collector's girls for trespassing – think your map's wrong –"

"Shut up," said Kraglin. Gave the girl a once-over, and rubbed his stubbly jaw. "What sorta present?" Yondu'd sent him the bare bones of the job on the way down. _Crab's got Quill and Vaas. We get 'em out again._ But knowing the boss, this 'present' could be anything from an EMP-grenade to a new trinket that he wanted unbroken, at the possible expenditure of Kraglin's less-favoured organs.

"These." She snapped her fingers. Three more girls came forwards, high gravity dwellers dressed in identical rags. Their eyes were quick and untrusting. They got within five foot, then unhooked a veritable armoury of fully loaded plasma rifles from around their scraggy torsos and tossed them at Kraglin's boots.

Kraglin boggled down at the collection. Yondu'd certainly ensured he had plenty of choice. "Those?" he repeated weakly.

The trio merged back into the huddle of ripped clothes and dirty skin, as the leader of the street rats treated him to a wide and gap-ridden grin. "Those."

"And I 'spect he's gone on ahead? Alone?"

"Yup. Said – I quote – _if you slaggers show up late to the party I'm promoting Horuz."_

 _Jackass._ "Right." Kraglin glanced at the scuttle-cam that was skulking along the seam between metal and flesh by the nearest shopfront. Then pinched the bridge of his nose, sighed, and stooped to retrieve a rifle. "Axley?"

Axley, breath already recovered – Kraglin hoped his refractory period wasn't so stellar elsewhere – set to strapping pistols and automatics to every inch of brawn his beefy shoulders had to boast. "Yessir?"

"Captain wants us to gatecrash his meet." Kraglin slung another rifle strap over shoulder, and tucked a pair of nifty rapid-fire blasters besides the ones already holstered in his belt. Then picked the meatiest gun of the bunch, cocked with a resounding clunk, and shot the scuttle-cam through the eye.

The urchins ducked from his path as he began to walk, carving a clear wedge through the traders as they crushed against the passage walls to make way. The Ravager coat gleamed liquid under the strobing sparks of a welding torch, light sliding off it like oil, and his grin was jagged and deadly. "Let's go make some noise."

* * *

"Scuse me! Coming through; out the way – move it, fatso!"

Yondu elbowed onwards. This close to the gates, the people were almost as numerous as the appliances they were clutching. Analogue, digital, nanotech, fleshmod: Crab could fix it all. Might even upgrade it if he was feeling generous. Or experimental – which had a tendency to result in vast tracts of land being rendered uninhabitable for the next millennium. In fact, it was usually wise to throw in a little on-the-side to encourage his cronies to sate their scientific curiosity elsewhere.

A few folks attempted to shove back, but most were too busy protecting their armfuls of fizzing circuitry. Yondu scoffed. Give him yaka any day.

…On that note, this was taking too long. He wet his lips and whistled.

It was a pure note, no trills. Pitch set height and amplitude speed, while the punctuation of the notes affected motion. A steady whistle like this kept the arrow moving ahead of him smoothly, and at a constant pace. Took a bit of learning to maintain, but damn, if it wasn't effective.

Within a blink, the crowds cleared. A quintet of scuttle-cams crawled after him, their forelegs scratching his heels as they flanked in tight formation. Yondu held the whistle until his lungs ached. Then let it drop, the arrow hanging motionless in the air, tethered to its sheathe by a shimmering thread of red radiation. He strolled past the whispering and pointing medley of customers-to-be. Grabbed his arrow, and used its solid fletching to bang three times on the door.

There was a long silence. And then, in a hiss of air as cold and stale as that from the deepest crypt, the Crab's vault cracked.

The dark sliver grew to an inch in diameter. Yondu gave the gate a kick and it glided the rest of the way, spilling the variegated lights of the tech district into the dim cavern like a rainbow regurgitated from the throat of a world-eater.

"Don't worry," he said to the woman next in line. "Won't be long."

* * *

 **:facepalms: YONDUUUUUUU**

 **Question: how many times do you think Kraglin's uttered the phrase 'Yondu? Yon-don't.'**

 **Please review!**


	5. Chapter 5

**In which Yondu pays the Crab a visit.**

* * *

He reached ten steps before the skittering scuttle-cams were joined by heavier tread.

Two of them. One on each side, falling in from invisible tributaries. Crab liked his headquarters dry and dark, the best conditions for picking apart delicate circuitry. His henchmen wore night-vision gear, insectoid helmets with harlequin-green eyes, and tramped through the lightless labyrinth as if it were a bright summer day. Any newcomers tottered blind, guided only by the drag of their hands along the mined tooth. But Yondu's eyes and implant exuded a glow of their own. He bobbed through the gloom like a jellyfish in deep ocean, lighting his own way.

"So," he said conversationally, tossing a glance to the guard on his right. Hefty lass, biceps big as his head. Arrow to the throat would be quickest, if it came to it. "You come here often?"

Left-guard bumped his spine with something that felt suspiciously like an electric stun-baton – depowered to preserve the darkness. For now. "No talking."

Yondu shrugged. Fiddled with his wristpiece instead, fumbling out the buttons by touch alone. He kept his arm crossed in front of his belly so the guards couldn't see, scanning the walls for scuttle-cams. Assured that Crab wasn't watching – or at least, had the decency to pretend otherwise – he tapped out a series of quick messages for Kraglin: _I'm in. Ask kids 4 other access. Guns to Vaas & crew._ Then, after a brief consideration – _Get Quill out first._

There. All bases covered.

Another prod at his shoulder brought him to a halt. The luminescence from his implant spilt across seven smooth triangles, set into a circle as wide as he was tall and then half again. Their tips formed the corolla of a steel-hewn rose.

"Cute door."

"I said no talking."

"Right."

The Guard on his right reached over his shoulder. Her boobs scraped his armour plates – the shockstick digging into his kidney subdued any comments that might have been pending. A swipe of her gloved palm over the panel and the petals peeled apart. Yondu snorted.

"Would've thought the Crab'd invest in better security."

Left-guard snorted right back, and louder. "Thought you was a thief. Don'tcha know a psionic lock when you see one?" Then realized he'd broken his own rule and prodded Yondu over the retracting panels with a few more volts than was strictly necessary. "And what part of 'no talking' don't you understand?"

Ravager leathers might stave off chemical burns and coolant leaks, but they didn't do shit for insulation. Yondu spasmed, staggered, and span with a twitching snarl. "I'll give ya _no talking_ –"

The door, now between him and his escort, clamped shut. So did Yondu's mouth. He sent Kraglin a quick scan of the palm reader and the words _psionic lock, work it out_ , motion hidden by his coat. Then turned to greet his host. "Crab. Lookin' freaky as ever."

The Crab's wizened lips made a pucker associated with elsewhere on the anatomy. "Udonta. A pleasure, I'm sure."

This room was brighter than the adjoining corridor. An octagon of sleek black glass, polished to a mirror, against which the occupants stood out like coloured cut-outs. Crab's hologram hunched at its centre, withered and vulturous. The multitool appendages grafted to his shoulderblades had morphed into a pair of pincers. They circled lazily above his head like snakes scenting the air.

Yondu padded forwards, sparing a wave for Vaas and the others. Each Ravager had an arm twisted past the point of pain by an insect-helmeted guard. As for Quill, there was no sign. Yondu pretended not to notice. "So," he said, stopping in front of the Crab and spreading his arms. "Here we are. Pair of old friends."

"I wouldn't call us _friends_ , Udonta. Not after Janadva-9."

"Hey, I apologized for that…"

"You did not!"

"Ain't my fault ya couldn't hear me over the explosion…"

Vaas' snicker became a ragged moan when the guard wrenched her shoulder an inch further out of its socket. "Boss… Hurry it up."

"Yeah, yeah." Yondu stuffed his hands in his pockets and looked the Crab up and down. "So? What d'you want?"

The Crab tipped until Yondu could see hollow eyesockets over the reflective black glasses. His smile was bloodless and cold. "No asking after your Terran?"

"Oh, he ain't here?" Yondu made a show of looking about. "Huh. Yeah, I guess. Kid's useful, when he ain't blasting his music… Speaking of, you must be getting sick of that by now. Perhaps you oughta pay me to take him off your hands?"

Vaas managed to stifle her giggle – luckily for the tendons in her arm. If Crab had eyes, they'd be narrowed.

"You think I won't dissect him in front of you, for the pleasure of making you squirm?"

"Pass," said Yondu. "I just washed this coat, and Terrans splat."

Crab drew himself up. "You think I don't see through your bluffs?"

Yondu shrugged. "Be kinda surprised if you didn't. If ya thought I'd _really_ washed this coat in the last year..."

How long would it take Kraglin to crawl through the ventilation pipes? Then trick the Guards into opening the interior door – because psionic locks were a bugger, and could only be disengaged wilfully. Yondu hoped he got a move on. His supply of one-liners wasn't endless and as fun as it was pissing the Crab off, his comms crew weren't going to be much use in a firefight if they all had dislocated arms.

Crab's sneer made the wrinkles around his mouth crease like crumpled tissue paper. He didn't raise his voice, but addressed it to the inside of his high neckhole, where there must be a secreted mic. "Bring out the boy. We'll see how much Udonta thinks he's worth."

The walls, floor and ceiling were all tiled in the same glossy obsidian, seamless and smooth. The panel slid open in a silent concertina, then shut just as soundlessly, melding into the blank black glass. Only difference was, now there were three guards and one small Terran in front of it rather than behind. One small, shivering, and very scared looking Terran, who looked dangerously close to waterworks.

"Y-Yondu?"

"Keep your mouth shut, kid." Yondu's glare might be able to curdle blood, but it didn't do so well against tears. Quill's lip started to wibble. Aw _hell_.

Crab laughed, a corpselike-croak. "I thought you said the boy was _useful._ Look at him. So _scared_."

He couldn't have done a better job at making Quill buck up if he tried. The boy drew himself as tall as he could get – not very – chin stiffening from its jelly-impersonation, and made a futile attempt at shouldering off the guards. "I am _not_ scared!"

Vaas coughed. Quill's expression faltered, and he slowly sunk down again. "Uh. I mean. Please rescue me, captain."

Oh- _kay._

Vaas must've warned the kid against standing up to Crab. Wise lass. Yondu'd thank her later – by not docking her next cut by more than half, seeing as technically, this was still her fault. He turned to Crab. "Yeah, his acting needs some work. But it's amazing where folk's'll let you go, if you drag along a kid. So m'willing to go halves on their bounties –" A thumb over his shoulder at the comms crew – "And toss in another hundred for the boy."

As if. Yondu parted with credits like hungry babies from teats. But an opening gambit of that magnitude wasn't outside of what'd be expected; Crab would egg him up and Yondu'd whittle him down, and then Kraglin would swing in from the sidelines and they'd see how many bug-helmeted minions they could butcher before the Crab's hologram fizzled out.

At least, that was the plan.

Crab waved a lazy hand. "It seems you weren't lying when you claimed not to care for him."

Well, Yondu wasn't gonna deny that. "Just a snack I picked up on some Terran planet," he lied. "Wasn't as hungry as I thought, so kept him around."

"Very well." Crab shrugged. "He's of no use to me either. Kill him."

Quill's eyes took up half his face as the guards switched on their shocksticks with a crackle, and amped the green lightning until it spat and flared. "Hey – what? You said – you said – Vaas!"

* * *

A sharp whistle.

The shockstick hit the floor, charge fizzling fractal cracks in the glass. It was followed by the three guards, all with neat penny-sized holes bored through their helmets' bulbous temples. Peter stumbled backwards, nausea rising in his throat. The guards had looked plastic and weird, swaddled neck to ankle in black bodysuits. But underneath they were flesh, and flesh scorched and sizzled when it came into contact with concentrated gamma radiation, and (as Peter was discovering) smelt disturbingly like barbeque. A trickle of smoke wound from the perforated helmets. Yondu caught his arrow and span to face his captive comms crew.

"Don't just stand there!" he snapped at Peter. "Ground, now!"

* * *

 **Short chapter! Let's just say that the next one'll get us up-to-date with the present. ;)**

 **Anyway, for now I leave you with the image of Kraglin trying to shunt Axley through child-sized ducts. Enjoy.**


	6. Chapter 6

**In which there is a fight, and many years of bad luck are accrued.**

 **I hope this chappie doesn't move too quick. I cut out a scene with Axley and Kraglin in the tunnel because it felt kinda extraneous when I read over it. But hopefully you can piece together what happened~ x**

* * *

Thankfully, the mooks didn't wait to execute the comms crew before retaliating. Yondu slammed belly-first into the deck, Quill not one second later. Arcs of lightning blazed from each shockstick and pulverized the wall. The glass shattered in a chiming cacophony, shards raining down over Yondu's back. He wrapped his arms over his head, trusting the coat to deflect the worst of the damage.

Crab wasn't big on office vegetation. Shame really – helped reduce stress levels at work, or some sorta bullshit. Also a shame because it put a crimp in Yondu's empathic aiming abilities; with no lower life forms around whose nerve-nets he could tap, he was restricted to visuals. Which meant, when you were trying to kill a plethora of bad guys in close vicinity with your own troops while lying face down on the floor, you were running the risk of friendly fire. Nope, Yondu couldn't whistle until he was back on his feet. Thankfully, shocksticks had a recharge time – albeit a short one. The second the green flashes died he burst upwards, pushing off his arms, and ran for Quill, glancing over his shoulder and taking out the nearest guard as he did so.

One crewmember free. Seven to go.

"Reinforcements!" Crab's hologram shrieked. His vocals jerked about the octaves as the second volley smacked the floor inches from Yondu's boots. He hauled Quill up by the armpits and flung them both to the side, rolling to avoid the scything electric blades. Kid got a bit squashed, but it was better than dead. Crab's face was fluxing between fury and glee, although that might have more to do with his pixels malfunctioning from the static.

"Huh," said Yondu. Picked a black splinter out of his cheek. And ran directly at the plinth, dragging Peter along. Lightning seared the edge of the kid's coat; he screamed like he was trying to deafen him – unnecessary, given that the air was already popping with noisy charge, and each crash of energy slammed the glass like a physical weight. Or, in this case, the holocrystals maintaining Crab's hovering likeness. Not that he wouldn't still be patching audial feeds from the scuttle-cams, or giving orders over his men's internal relays – but at least Yondu didn't have to keep looking at his mug.

He managed to shoot the woman holding Vaas before the seven-pointed door hissed open and a crowd of guards poured in. Each was armed with a shockstick.

Except the two at the back.

"About fuckin' time," Yondu muttered. Whistled the remaining comms crew free, and shoved Quill roughly aside to let a jagged green sickle slice the air between. Everything tasted of electricity and split nitrogen, and Quill's hair was prickled like a spooked porcupig. The kid landed hard on his side. One of the guards jabbed their shockstick towards him, and Yondu tensed in preparation to whistle – when they were apprehended by Kraglin, ripping off the buglike helmet and firing a round into his unprotected belly.

Yondu didn't have time for salutations. Just dashed over and unbuckled a pair of pistols from round his first mate's waist to toss at Vaas and Neets.

"Make yourselves useful!" he snapped, as Axley put a guard down for the count with a punch that could've felled an overgrown flora colossus. "Axley! If you ain't gonna use them guns, give 'em to folks who will!"

"Yessir!" Axley deposited his load, kicking rifles and pistols to the remaining comms crew. They formed up, a motley medley of scars, skin-colours, and grimy red leather, and faced the oncoming swarm. Kraglin even remembered to grab Quill, hustling him to stand between them as the guards spilt into the glass-strewn room, their fractured reflections looming from every angle. Yondu saw his grin, crooked and yellow, bounced back a thousand times. His whistle cut through the tinkle of falling glass, the pant of his men's breath, the thud of the guards' boots as the Crab's entire payroll charged through the dusky enamel maze. The arrow danced around them, a red dragonfly that span across a scene so still it could've been captured in a photograph. Fifty shocksticks levelled, and fifty blank black visors inclined. Behind him, his crew was tensed, ready to spring apart in every direction.

"Ready?" Yondu asked.

"Ready," Kraglin said, bundling Quill into his side. His eyes were locked on the open door. Good lad. That was all Yondu needed to know.

"Scatter!" he roared, and fired his arrow through the nearest guard's heart.

* * *

Getting through the doors was the hardest part. The backfolded petals formed a bottleneck through which guards gushed like rapids after rain. It would take a concentrated rush to pierce.

Yondu led the charge. The guards couldn't use their shocksticks at full power if you stayed close – too much of a risk of zapping themselves – and so he bore the tooth-rattling spike of pain as one lanced him in the shoulder, and took the opportunity to whistle him and the five behind him down. Which left, for the briefest of moments, a clear path.

"Kraglin!"

"On it, boss!"

His first mate galloped past, a whirlwind of lanky legs. Quill was forced into a sprint. Yondu wrenched the shockstick out of the dead guard's hand, applied it to his neighbour, and tossed it at the head of the mook who was moving to apprehend the pair. Even fired up it didn't do more than bonk, the low charge siphoning harmlessly to earth through the threads woven into the guard's bodysuit. But it was enough to distract her, and the next moment she had an arrow in place of an eyeball.

Behind him, the fight was petering out. They were working through the guards in the main atrium, and only three casualties on their side so far – two comms guys who were past repair, and Neets, sporting a livid lightning-burn that'd charred through jacket and hip and melded leather to flesh. But she'd kept hold of her pistol, so they weren't leaving her behind. The plump Shi'ar clung weakly to Axley's shoulders as he battered to Yondu, bouncing head cushioned by her jowls. "Sir!"

Yondu smacked his ass to keep him moving. "Go help Krags! The rest of ya, concentrate on them that're comin' in from the tunnel – we'll be outta here in no time!"

This was met with a round of approval. And a plasma blast, which singed Yondu's left ear.

He whipped around, arrow scything through the belly of a guard closing from the right, and whistled – only to jerk off the sound before he impaled Vaas' bald skull front-to-back. She was scowling at her smoking pistol. Another comms guy went down behind her – the Kronan, torched alive with a full shockstick voltage. No time for obituaries. Yondu sent the arrow spinning through the next three guards who had moved to block their escape, yelling between breaths –

"Hey Vaas! Careful with that thing!"

Vaas beat the barrel on her thigh, then held it up to her eye and squinted down it. "Ain't aiming right… I'm no good with ammo-age machinery…"

There was another guard readying to jam his shockstick into her stomach. Yondu took him out with a rattling tone, arrow winding tightly between the tussling bodies of Ravagers and the remaining guardsmen, and stomped over to help. His arrow set up a perimeter, trajectory guided by the initial whistle and maintained with pulses from his implant, skewering any enemy who dared breach the circle. They were thinning – one final push should see them clear.

"S'yawing left," he decreed at last, nose scrunched as he wrestled with the adjustor dial. "Fuck. This is wedged – so you gotta swing right to compensate. Half an inch should do it." Yondu patted her shoulder and fastened her grip around the pistol before turning and barrelling towards Kraglin, who, aided by Axley, had almost gotten Quill to the battle's edge. "C'mon, guys! Let's finish this!"

"Right you are, sir," said Vaas, and shot him in the head.

* * *

 **Please review! I never get reviews on and it makes me sad. :kissus:**


	7. Chapter 7

**In which Kraglin utilizes a shockstick, Axley has doubts, and Yondu is most definitely Not Dead**

 **I wish I could say I was sorry, but alas.**

* * *

After that, lots of things happened at once.

"Sorry Ax," said Neets, pressing her pistol against his curly blonde crown. She was about to pull the trigger when Kraglin smacked the barrel aside. The blast that would've popped his skull like a ripe grape splattered into the guard behind them, plasma chewing through helmet and face alike. His screams rang hollow. Kraglin was deafened, jarred off balance. Fear hammered a chisel down the seam of his brain. His ears were ringing and his eyes half-blinded by the flashing shocksticks, and he must have been mistaken, because there was no way that…

"Yondu!" Peter screamed. Tried to shove towards him. Neets, growling, swung her gun around.

"Terran brat –"

It should've been harder, killing her. But Kraglin slipped a knife under her ribs, piercing the leather-mottled rawness of her side, and let her slump from Axley in a plump puddle. He grabbed a fistful of Quill's hair and used it to yank him back. "Get him outta here."

Axley was staring at the place where Yondu'd been standing with creeping horror. "Uh."

There were still guards all around. This wasn't the time for dithering. Kraglin mimicked Neets, and rapped his gun warningly on the big guy's forehead, right between the upper set of eyes. Axley jolted from the stupor with a stuttering blink. "Go. Now. I'll get the captain."

Because it was just a graze, right? Nothing serious. Yondu was… dazed. Bit of concussion. Kraglin could mock him later for fainting in the middle of a firefight; for now he had to drag him out of there before someone made the damage permanent.

Quill's blubbering receded as Axley strode for the gates. Kraglin didn't look back. He stepped over the fallen bodies of the guards that were cluttering the doorway. Fished a shockstick from the twitching pile, and brandished it alongside his pistol as Vaas advanced. Four comms officers were down for the count, felled by the last wave of guards and felled in turn. It was just him, her, her last two accomplices, and a room of black and red uniforms, blood leaking over the mirrored tiles. Vaas trekked red footprints as she walked, smile glacial. Kraglin held his ground. "The fuck you doing?" he asked.

"What's it look like?"

Kraglin's lips curled down. "Looks like mutiny."

Vaas chuckled. "Always knew you was a smart one."

"Crew ain't gonna stand for this."

"What – for their mutineer of a captain to be ousted by another one?" She wagged her pistol mockingly from side to side. "C'mon Krags. He was compromised; you oughta know better than anyone. Ravagers are better off without him – him and that brat of his. Something me and the Crab agreed on." Her expression lost all humour. "It's a shame about you, though. Wouldn't have minded keeping you on as a first mate. But if he's compromised for the kid, you're compromised for him."

Kraglin didn't deny it. No point. She was comms officer – while the Ravagers didn't bother with security cameras, she had the know-how to pull up feeds from anyone's wristwatch, and they caught every word. Of course she knew. He and the boss were gonna have to be more careful, in future. Kraglin kept both weapons trained as Vaas slunk closer, and closer still. She paused when his pistol pressed on her chest, and hers on his. Around them, the remnants of the comms crew slunk like hyenas circling injured prey.

"Drop 'em," Vaas said.

Kraglin smirked. "Not likely."

He almost shot her when she kicked Yondu in the ribs. There wasn't any reaction. "He's already dead." Lies. "You could walk away."

"Would ya let me?"

Her smile had been sketched with a knifeblade. "Try me. See how far ya get." Kraglin considered. Looked down at himself – clad in the armour of the unfortunate sod he'd ambushed and stripped. Then at Vaas, in her Ravager reds.

Her conductive Ravager reds.

"No thanks," he said. Then smacked her arm aside, shot flying wide, and buried his shockstick in her gut.

There hadn't been time to charge the thing fully – she'd have noticed if he had. But these babies still packed a mighty punch on half-power. Vaas flew backwards and crashed into the broken mirror, glass shivering from her singed coat.

Kraglin made the most of the surprise, hefting Yondu up under his armpits – guy was limp as a sack; couldn't he at least _try_ and make this easier? He'd dragged him three paces before the mutineers came to their senses, rifles steadying on level with his head. _Shit_.

Kraglin froze. Gasped inadvertently when a pair of shots rang out. Regretted it, when the Ravagers crumpled and Axley stormed out of the darkness, face as ugly as it was ever gonna get. "I'm gonna kill her," he seethed, closing on Vaas, who groaned and weakly tried to raise her head. As tempting as that prospect was, Kraglin halted him with a hiss.

"How's about ya deal with clean-up _after_ we haul the captain outta here?"

Axley's murderous snarl wavered. Folded into something that looked worryingly akin to pity. "Kraglin –"

"Gimme a hand, would ya? He's heavy."

"Kraglin, I don't think…"

Pussyfooting wasn't helping nobody. Kraglin sighed and started the arduous task of dragging Yondu over the hillock of dead and unconscious guards that was blocking the doorway. Those who'd recovered their senses were smart enough to pretend otherwise. He took vindictive delight into digging his heels into their wounds. "He ain't dead, okay?"

"Look at him," said Axley quietly.

Kraglin did. Glanced away again. "It's just hit his implant. Plasma ain't gonna chew through that like it does skin and bone. Seriously. He's fine." He sounded so certain he almost managed to convince himself. Yondu sagged as his grip slipped, almost slithering down the heaped corpses; Kraglin barely managed to grab him in time, and swore again as his captain's head rolled against his bicep and left a smear of liquefied crystal. "Shit, shit – Axley, help me. You gotta help me."

Axley dithered, eyes skating between him and Vaas, who was struggling to sit. Then flung his depleted pistols on the floor and jogged to join him. He didn't try to pick Yondu up alone, although he probably could. Just hooked one of his arms over his shoulder and bore the brunt of the weight as the three of them staggered into the shadows of the tunnel beyond.

Kraglin was the first to emerge from the excavated tooth. He dragged the gate open, gleaming with sweat, pupils shrunk to pinpricks at the bombardment of colour and sound. Axley didn't really require his help in lugging their captain along, but the big guy knew better than to tell him so; he waited for Kraglin to re-join him before pulling Yondu into the light.

Then frowned, and scanned the rapidly retreating merchants as if he was searching for one in particular.

"Where's Peter?" he asked.

* * *

Peter was getting as far away as he could. Yondu was dead. He'd seen it. Like he'd seen his mom die, only _worse,_ because there'd been no warning and it'd been violent and horrible and all his fault.

Peter thudded to a stop. He had no idea where he was, but there were tears streaking his cheeks and his eyes felt puffy and hot. He raised a tentative hand. Balled it, and knuckled the fist into his eyesocket as hard as he could bear. Vaas had said it was a _joke_! That it'd be funny! That her and Crab were gonna play a _trick_ on Yondu, not that Crab's men would threaten to kill him; not that everyone'd start screaming and bleeding and Vaas would _shoot Yondu in the head…_

He shuddered. Axley had run in again after Kraglin, pausing only to push one of his pistols into Peter's hands; so they were probably dead too. They were all dead, and it was because he'd lied like Vaas had told him too, so Yondu thought the comms crew were captured rather than biding their time.

She'd killed them. And if he didn't keep moving, she would kill him too.

Peter locked out his trembling knees. Took a series of stiff-legged steps, then, as the joints began to loosen, transitioned to a trot and a shambling run. The gun was lightweight and plastic, looking more like a water pistol than any firearm Peter'd seen. But it weighed at the end of his arm like a dumbbell, and whenever he saw the bobbing barrel through his tears, the vibrant eruption of red from Yondu's forehead played and replayed. By the time he'd left the excavated crevice of the Celestial's gum he was at a full sprint, breath wheezing with panic, and the only reason he hadn't dropped it was because his fingers were clamped too tight to relax.

Where could he go? What could he do? Not head back to the ship, not when there were untold numbers of Vaas' conspirators lurking. Nowhere was safe. They were gonna catch him and shoot him like they'd shot Yondu, and Peter could still see it: the whiplash jerk of his head as it absorbed the plasma's flaming tongue then spat it out the other side, and he was crying too hard to see…

Which is why, when the hands grabbed him and yanked him into the shadow of a jetboots stall, he assumed the assailant was an enemy and punched them in the balls. Only their balls turned out to be their face, which was on level with his. The girl reeled back. Spat out a bloody incisor. "Fuck. There goes another one."

Peter lowered his shaking fist. The gun rattled in his grip. "W-who are you?"

"What, no apology? You're Ravager stock, alright." She drooled blood over her grubby bare feet, then slurped up the drip and smacked her lips. "Mm. Right. Guess it didn't go so good?"

"What didn't, I don't understand…"

The girl rolled her eyes. "Your captain's plan, dipshit. He dead?" Peter's liquefying chin told her all she needed to know. "Fuck. I told 'im so. Alright. You better come with me."

And she stepped backwards, through the wall. Or rather, through the curtain that'd been draped across a borehole and painted with the same necrosified splotches as the surrounding tissue. A borehole that only a child could squeeze through. Peter eyed it as if it had fangs. "Where?"

"Somewhere safe." The girl dropped to her hands and knees and started to crawl. The flap fluttered down after her, and Peter watched through the threadbare fabric as her heels vanished into the gloom. "C'mon! And lose the coat!"

* * *

 **Peter is the Carl of the gotg-universe, I stg**

 **Please leave reviews! No matter how small - they mean a lot. :3**


	8. Chapter 8

**In which Crab and Vaas conspire, Peter crawls, and Kraglin comes up with a cunning plan.**

* * *

"Are you telling me that you decimated my men, destroyed my conference room, and _failed_ to retrieve Udonta's head?"

Vaas yawned, scratching her nose with the tip of Yondu's inactive arrow. "Ain't your employee, Crab."

"No, just my accomplice," Crab snapped. Wherever he was projecting from, it didn't have ample room to pace; he stomped back and forth along a five metre line, turning in a brisk flurry of holopixels at the end of each march. "And when Udonta returns, he'll want revenge."

Vaas' smirk trained on the crust of dried blood she'd picked from her left nostril. "Oh, Udonta's dead. Don't you worry about that."

Crab didn't let himself celebrate prematurely. "And his first mate?" At Vaas's silence he growled and hunched his shoulders. The second prosthetic set of arms twisted in viperish fury. "Then we still have a _problem_. You know how the captain title's passed. It's not to the overseer of communications! If Obfonteri comes back…"

"He won't," said Vaas, but she didn't sound especially confident. Crab's grimace grew.

"You'd better ensure that he doesn't! Hunt down the boy as well. And the big fellow. I assume you want to keep the nature of your ascension secret?"

"Would be best." Vaas rubbed the dried blood into a ball at flicked it at the cleft mirror, tucking the arrow into her belt. "Udonta mighta gone soft, but he was good at bringing home the booty. Don't want no one kicking up a fuss – or getting the same idea about me."

"True, true." Crab's blind face swivelled uncannily in her direction. Vaas saw the glimmer of his holofeed in the reflection of his glasses, a bluish spectre of herself marooned against broken black. "How do you plan on encouraging the crew to follow you, though? You must have some ploy to avoid anarchy."

"Alliance with you'll be a good start." Vaas grinned. "And those new relays we was talking about, before we got down to business…"

Crab held up a wizened hand. "Fetch me the skulls of Udonta, Obfonteri and Quill," he said, "and I will give you whatever you wish."

* * *

Click. Click. Click-ck. Click.

Kraglin held his breath.

Click. Click. Cl-

The scuttle cam's red eye fizzled out and it uttered a high-pitched motorized scream, the hole in its thorax spluttering sparks. Another one down. But that was the third one he'd shot since they'd bunkered down here, and the consistent failure of the feeds would attract attention. It was time to move.

"We gotta go," he muttered to Axley. "Off Knowhere, if we can." He'd tried Isla's comm, and Morlug's – even Horuz's in a last-ditch effort – but all buzzed blank. Vaas must be sabotaging the waves. No doubt Crab had enough equipment in his layer to have her little techie heart turning cartwheels. They could make a break for the ship – but that'd be what Crab was expecting, and there was a helluva lot of open tongue to cover between here and there. Plus, after this display, Kraglin wasn't sure how much he trusted the Galleon crew not to shank their Admiral while he was down. No – best they lay low for until Yondu was back on his feet. Or at least, y'know, responsive.

He was breathing. Kraglin had ascertained it – with difficulty, and after several increasingly frantic attempts. They were crouched in the gulley behind an abandoned translator-implant stall, and Kraglin had one hand resting on Yondu's chest to make sure that raspy rise and fall didn't stop. He wasn't sure what he'd do, if it did.

Axley, squatting on Yondu's other side with his bulk all the more emphasized by the tight space, scanned the street up and down. "What about Peter?" he asked.

Kraglin shook his head. There'd been no sign of the boy, not since he'd first been pronounced missing. It was as if he'd melted away. Gone as quickly as he'd entered into their lives, after wreaking untold amounts of destruction. How one tiny kid could carry so much unlucky baggage was beyond him. "Peter'll have to handle himself." Yondu'd be pissed once he woke, but right now there were more immediate concerns. Kraglin crawled over Yondu's belly, kneeling on the streetside. He reluctantly broke contact to scope the crowds. The tech centre was filling again, whisperings of _Crab_ and _Ravager_ and _mutiny_ bubbling at the edge of Kraglin's hearing – but Crab was evidently scanning for them further afield, because here, close to the core of his nest, there were no black suits and no helmets among the nattering denizens.

He and Axley had already dumped their coats. They'd stripped Yondu's as well – Kraglin'd insisted on stuffing it into a crack under the cover of a looming tooth; never knew when boss'd want to return for it. Their disguises had been completed with the acquisition (by less-than-legal means) of a trio of hooded ponchos which draped formlessly around them and obscured their faces from all but the closest scrutiny. Kraglin had winced as he pulled Yondu's over the mangled mess of his implant, and prayed that whatever coma he'd dropped into, it made him immune to pain.

"We're clear," he whispered. Axley nodded, all business, and Kraglin looked away as he heaved Yondu into a fireman hold. No sense bickering – if he tried to help, he'd just slow them down. He satisfied himself with securing his pistol in the pocket of the poncho so any blasts would be muffled by the fabric and pulling up a map on his wristpiece. Where would Vaas and Crab be least likely to look? Where would Ravagers never willingly go?

Well, there was only one answer to that. Kraglin smiled without emotion and set their course. "This way."

* * *

The girl motioned for silence. Bounded over the broken vent grill, heedless of the drop. They were moving above the spinal fluid refinement centre, and when Peter popped his head out the hole gopher-style he saw a vast factory floor, distillers fatter than an M-ship was long, and tanks and tanks of yellow juice that could house Olympic swimming pools. Workers sculled the scummy tops with long-handled rakes, working from boardwalks crudely nailed together overhead. The smell was bodily and pungent, like a lanced boil. Peter wrinkled his nose. And almost shrieked as the girl grabbed him by the hair and pulled him up into the dank dark crawlspace once again. "Ow! What!"

"Shut up!" she hissed. "You want to get seen?"

No. He most definitely did not. Peter sullenly shut his mouth. Then opened it again. "Hey, what's your name?"

"Don't got one," said the girl. "And keep your voice down." Peered over her shoulder and saw traces of pity on Peter's face – and was sure to kick him in the jaw under the pretence of stretching a cramp from her calf. Her foot smelt almost as gross as it looked. "Most folks call me Gajit."

"Thanks for saving my life, Gajit." He said it as sincerely as was possible when inhaling a stranger's fungal toe jam. Hadn't mom said he ought to be polite?

Gajit chuckled darkly, winching herself under a low-hanging pustule that halved the width of the tunnel and leaked a steady drip of pus. "Don't go thanking me until you find out where I'm gonna stow ya." The rasp of her elbows over age-hardened flesh never faltered and Peter, wincing, could only follow.

* * *

 **Ho hum. Short chappie. And very...** _ **fillerish**_ **.**

 **Still, please drop a review if you liked it! Makes my day (and gives me motivation... *hinthint*)**


	9. Chapter 9

**In which Axley and Kraglin and Yondu walk into the lion's den. Metaphorically. Well. Axley and Kraglin do. Yondu flops. You get the gist.**

* * *

"This is a bad idea," said Axley. He'd repeated that sentiment several times over the last hour, ever since Kraglin told him the plan, and the first mate hadn't had much patience to begin with.

"Look around you," he snapped, slitting the empty plasma cartridge and upending it over his last clip to salvage the last scorching drops. "See any of Crab's men?"

"No." A beat. "But I do see Horde, Kraglin. Lots and _lots_ of Horde."

Kraglin fastened the screw cap. Shook twice to ensure the slim glass cylinder wasn't about to spring a deadly leak, and popped it in. He crossed to Axley, who was dithering on the edge of the territory the Horde had claimed, and busied himself with tugging the hood lower over Yondu's implant. They could pass him off as Kree so long as no one checked the eyes. But people carried stranger cargos through the Ravager dock day and night; the same would be true of this end of the Celestial's mouth, Kraglin was sure. All they had to do was act like they were supposed to be here, and they could nab a fighter ship and fly for the nearest medimoon.

After that… After that, Kraglin wasn't sure. He refused to contemplate that this was permanent, that his captain was gonna rot out the rest of his days as a dumb vegetable. That weren't no way to go. Better he finish him off himself than leave him to that. But Yondu was a tough sonuvabitch, and as soon as his brainpan had registered the damage he'd be up and kicking in no time. Arrow might fly a bit wonky, but he could live with that.

He could live with anything, so long as Yondu woke up.

First things were first though. A ship.

Kraglin rolled his poncho over the gunbelt, touching the knives stowed in each sleeve for reassurance. He'd heard stories about the Horde captain. None were especially pleasant. But heck – everyone exaggerated, right? Poor fella had probably just come a cropper of a nasty accident and modded himself up to compensate. The rest was all hyperbole, spin put on to strike terror into delicate hearts, yada yada. Still. Wouldn't pay to let his guard drop, not even for a moment.

He took point as they crossed the line, the ground noticeably changing from ossified gum to rusty iron. Horde color was blue, blue like the middling core of an ocean trench. Navy dyed leather glistened under the glare of Horde-ship headlamps, patched and stitched, cropped with rubber and crude-hewn armour. Kraglin kept his head down and prayed that their black cloaks were of a similar enough shade to avoid notice.

They weren't.

"Oi! You there!" A Horde-girl. Gold-skinned, officious looking, hair scraped back in a bun. "You got something to sell, you stay in the trade zone. This here's our territory."

"Sorry," Kraglin croaked, sheepishly raising his empty hands. He kept his eyes downcast, focussing on her knotted laces. "New recruits."

"Huh. Who hired you?"

Damn. Well, Kraglin only knew one Horde name – "Uh. Romago?"

The expression on the Xandarian's face told him he'd chosen wrong. "You're tellin' me my captain hired two idiots and a catatonic drunk."

Kraglin scratched the back of his head, the hood scratching the shaved sides of his scalp. "Something like that?"

"I'll just check that with him, shall I?" Crap. Kraglin balked. Gossip the rumours might be, but that didn't mean he'd bet his life on that theory.

"You really wanna disturb him?" he hazarded. Knew he'd spoken right when the woman's face soured further. "Look. I didn't get a name from the fella who okayed it. But we're all able-bodied – including the Kree, when he ain't been at the bottle." He dealt Yondu's thigh a friendly slap. "Just need to split town for a while, earn some dishonest cash. Y'know?"

The woman looked down her long yellow nose. Kraglin held the gaze, jitteriness unfeigned, until she sighed and tapped her earpiece to cancel the call. "Y'see that orange-painted fighter, dock's end?" Kraglin nodded. "Go there. You can dredge the septic system while your buddy wakes up. Anyone asks, tell 'em Miss Lazgha sent you. We'll fit you for leathers once we're in orbit."

"Yes ma'am!" He even tossed in a salute. They were dismissed with a roll of ochre eyes.

Kraglin strode along the filed-flat crest of the tooth in the direction Lazgha had identified. Then, when a glance revealed that she'd been distracted by a stuttering rookie who'd misplaced his refuelling truck, he grabbed Axley's arm and hustled him under the engine of an unoccupied fighter. Yondu's head smacked heavily off the big guy's chest as Kraglin shoved him towards the ladder. "Get in."

Axley eyed the sealed hatch. "It's locked."

"And you're a Ravager. Work it out."

"Where're you going?"

Kraglin paused just beyond the fighter's shadow, silhouetted against the harbour lights. "Saving our asses. You'll see." He didn't stay to watch Axley wobble up the ladder. If he dared drop Yondu he'd flay him alive, and Axley knew it. Instead, Kraglin stalked along the rows of humming fighter jets until he caught the arm of an engineerish type. "Scuse me – I'm new. Lazgha said I was on anti-aircraft maintenance?"

* * *

The tunnel was a petrified sea-sponge, or perhaps a nightmare tugged from the brain of a trypophobe. Its bile-yellow surface was perforated by a thousand concentric and interlaid holes, the shallowest up to a metre in diameter and ridged like a bumpy scab, while the deeper were measured in inches and tightly grouped, their throats weathered smooth by the slow drizzle of phlegm.

"Where are we?" whispered Peter. He held out his arms for balance as he tiptoed around the rim of a crater. The ground was solid, albeit sticky, but it looked like it would dip and squish under his oversized boots. Peter imagined that the smallest hole could expand into a bottomless mouth, swallow him whole before knitting shut without a trace. He could only be grateful the ceiling was high enough that he didn't have to shimmy on his belly.

Ahead, Gajit sauntered across the slimy formation with the air of a bored tourguide. "Sinuses," she replied. "And ya can talk normally – ain't no one who knows about this place 'cept the brats and those small enough to reach it."

Peter frowned. Hopped a particularly _hungry_ looking cluster of holes, which puckered the surface of an organic lump and flared and contracted in time with the push and pull of the warm, moist breeze. "What're you going to do when you get too big?"

Gajit's laugh was half-cough. "Ya really think I'm gonna live that long?"

"Oh." Peter stuttered to a halt. Winced as the holes spasmed, bubbles of mucus bursting with wet pops. "I – I'm sorry?"

"Yeah, yeah. Whole damn Nova Empire is very sorry, I'm sure. But I don't see them doin' nothing about it." She peered behind her, sallow face half-hidden behind the jut of a too-prominent shoulder bone. "They might help you, though. Nice-looking healthy kid. Still got all your teeth."

Peter bit his lip, remembering a fist and a bloody browned and diseased molar being spat to clatter on the steel slabs of the tech market. "Sorry for that too."

"No worries. Sucking makes the food last longer, anyways. Speaking of…" Gajit trotted over, and hunkered besides the spitting collection of holes. Some were pinprick sized, others wide as a coffee mug, bunching and opening over the surface of the mound like time-lapsed spots on a fly agaric. "You hungry?"

Peter blanched. "No."

"Wuss." Gajit waited until the nearest puncture was at its widest, then shoved in a fist and extracted it before the wizened yellow lips could clamp. It came out dripping; she licked the viscous slime off her fingers as if it was honey. "Mm-mm. Ya don't know what you're missing out on."

Swallowing hard, Peter sidestepped around her and started for the cavern's narrow egress. "I don't think I wanna find out."

Gajit's laughter followed him. "You get hungry enough, you'd eat worse."

Their voices bounced oddly off the porous walls, acoustics at once dampened and echoing as if Knowhere's tissues were absorbing certain notes and rejecting others, and Gajit's words seemed to reverberate up from the holes beneath Peter's boots. Peter gulped and gauged the distance between him and the exit. "Am I worse?" he asked timidly. That only made Gajit cackle harder; Peter stopped his slow creep escapewards and crossed his arms. "It's not funny! Look, when you hang out with Ravagers…"

Gajit wiped away a tear. It might have been feigned, or just a symptom of the infected cuts creasing corners of her eyes like premature crow's feet. "Yeah, might wanna keep that whole _raised by the Ravagers_ thing on the down-low. At least, when you're busy playing cutesy with the Nova Corps." She stood in a crackle of filthy rags and strutted past Peter, taking point once again, and beckoned for him to keep up. "Don't want them to think you're pulling a heist. If you think Ravagers or guardsmen are dangerous, you oughta try stealing from a government official. Those fellas are _ruthless_."

"To bad guys," Peter amended, as she dropped to gauge the width of the next tunnel. "Only to bad guys, right?"

Gajit retracted from the crawlspace long enough to raise her eyebrows. "You think there's any _good guys_ on Knowhere, even Nova Corps? Think again. They ain't here for duty so much as pleasure, if ya get my drift."

"Then – then how'm I supposed to escape?"

"Simple." Gajit shunted her narrow shoulders through the ridged opening, wriggling through to the cavern beyond. "Ya keep smart and small and quiet, and you only get seen when you wanna be seen. Like me. Now hurry up before the passage shuts. There's all sortsa controls in place to stop Knowhere sneezing, but the brain's sensed us and this baby's gonna clench."

Blood drained from Peter's face. He spared a final fearful glance at the room of holes, all of which appeared to be shrinking. As soon as Gajit's dirty soles had cleared the gap he was through, close enough to feel the fleshy stone crimp at his waist.

"That was fun," he said weakly, examining the snotty gunge clogging his fingers like amphibian-webs. He valiantly battened down nausea when Gajit assessed her own handful, hummed, and happily began to lick.

* * *

Kraglin meekly introduced himself to the chief engineer, claimed a long and illustrious history in several obscure mechanical fields which were named off the top of his head, and joined him in pouring over a manual detailing the interior design of the anti-aircraft system: five massive canons hacked into the plaque along the canine's serrated peak which were in convenient need of renovation. Even a genius'd have a time of memorizing that whole schematic, much less puzzling it out. Kraglin laid claims to no such title. But he'd learnt all he needed to know from the diagram of the cables that snaked out from each cannon's base. The blasts were supplied by battery, individual to each massive machine. But the _targeting_ …

"So," said the girl who'd been assigned to partner him, as they dismantled the power core on the nearest cannon and pieced it around the new battery – Kraglin insisting she show him how it was done, under the pretence of being out of practice. Her smile hovered between flirtatious and suspicious. "Where was it you said you studied again?"

"Hraxian Institute," lied Kraglin easily. "Expelled from the class of '91AlphaZ-5, for smoking Huffer under the principal's window." He gave her a conspiratorial nudge. "And hardwiring a door to chop my least favourite professor in half, but the Huffer was the official reason."

Her eyes went a little starry, even as her clever fingers twizzled and spliced the wires into a sparse copper cradle. "You overrode the no-harm algorithms in Nova technology? You chopped someone in _half_ with a _door_?"

Kraglin kept his shrug modest. "They never proved nothing. We done here?"

She slotted a last relay into place, patting it twice. The blue plasma in the battery coil jittered as the current seared its surface, then steadily began to glow. The rumble as the cannon swung to ready was louder than the gastric emissions of a bilgesnipe.

"We are now."

"Cool," said Kraglin. Even meant it a little. He'd have to see what Yondu thought about investing in a coupla these babies, once he'd woken up – although of course, theirs would be more impervious to sabotage. And with a colour scheme closer to the red.

He waited for the girl to start her broad-hipped sashay for the next cannon in line. Then yanked out a handful of wires, protected from the zap and snap of high voltage by the glove he'd stolen from the Crab's men. Overhead, the cannon's burgeoning thunder stumbled, sputtered, and ebbed. Its long barrel clanked about its pivot with a mournful whir, and the glare of the concentrated plasma dimmed from azure to cobalt. "Shit! Think it's blown a fuse. You go on to the next 'un – I'll sort this baby."

She dithered. "Are you sure?"

"As my name's Bartrax Smiddleborg."

"Alright. I'll catch you later, Bartrax."

Kraglin saw her on her way with a wink. Then fell on the panels around the gun's foot, peeling them aside to access the cable beneath. He made short work of it, sliding the knife from his sleeve and hacking open the five-ply braid of plastic cords, deeming the job complete when the blade nicked iron beneath. A low crackle of white noise, one he wouldn't have noticed otherwise, was suddenly unmistakable in its loss.

Kraglin hastily returned the panels to their proper place and stood, joining the rest of the Horde in the immediate vicinity who were cocking their heads and frowning, trying to place the source of the audible shift. Once they'd shrugged and returned to their stations, he morphed his expression into one of exquisite panic and sprinted over to the central control hub, the core of the cables' vast spiderweb, and tugged on the chief engineer's arm. "Sir? Sir – I think we have a problem. Someone's busted the targeting system on canon 4 – fuse blew after we'd gotten the battery situated, so I thought I'd better check it out." The engineer's initial violent response to his dragging was stifled by fear.

"What happened? Captain wants these ready for a test volley by the end of the hour!"

"Don't know if it were an accident and they were trying to cover it up or if they did it on purpose, but it's totally mangled. I ain't got a clue where to start – whole segment needs replacing. Could ya go take a look?"

The engineer's face had taken on a greenish hue, made all the more interesting by the natural purple tint of his skin. "Stay here," he hissed, detaching Kraglin's grip and shoving him into his previous post. "Look busy, and don't mention a word of this – not to anyone! You remember what the captain did to the last chief?"

He wasn't 'playing with fire' so much as 'traipsing merrily into the heart of a furnace', and Kraglin's shiver wasn't feigned. A morbid part of him wanted to ask, but the rational half told him he didn't want to know. Couldn't go harbouring no guilt for what he was about to do, after all. The engineer took his grimace as an affirmation, treating him to a pinch-lipped nod before jogging through the weaving columns of Hordesmen packing and unpacking their latest haul, his violet head shiny with sweat. Kraglin returned it. Then wriggled his fingers, and laid them to rest across the array of buttons, dials and toggle-like analog sticks that ornamented the top of the console.

"Sucker," he muttered. Flipped his wristpiece open and found that Axley's line was static-free. "Hey idiot? You best be ready to fly." It was time to do what Ravagers did best – cause some chaos.

* * *

The Ravager frigates were hulking red trapezoids, cut from the gossamer curtains of the nebula behind. They'd been ordered to their new positions by the galleon's chief comms officer – something about being on the lookout for a rumoured Chitauri swarm, captain's orders – and were now arranged with two to the fore of Knowhere's skull and one to the aft, situated at the points of an equilateral triangle. The churn of their engines would've disguised the buzz as the new systems came online had they been in atmosphere; as it was, everything was soundless and weightless, and no one noticed the crude black boxes that'd been velcroed to each ship's belly at a calculated centre-point.

Sensors thinner than cat whiskers set up a steady vibration, and the frigates' pitted undersides caught the bouncing signal like multi-faceted satellite dishes. Beneath the Crab's layer, buried under miles of carved tooth and mined gum, Vaas' triangulation software flared to life. She smirked at the results, face lit from below by the ghastly red gleam.

"Got 'em," she said.

* * *

 **Edited very quickly. Please point out mistakes!**

 **Also, if you haven't read The One With The Hostile Takeover over on AO3 (can't be uploaded here because noncon D:) you won't know that Romago's very, very nasty. That's probably for the best.**

 **Also, reviews give me much-needed writing motivation... hint-hint.**


	10. Chapter 10

**In which Peter finds a junk droid, Vaas finds Peter, and Yondu wakes up.**

* * *

By the time Gajit pushed aside another skin-coloured cloth and reintroduced Peter to the world, blinking and sticky as a newborn, he'd almost forgotten what it felt like to stand. The final stretch of crawlways had been claustrophobic, an elongated coffin of fossilized tissue. He'd wriggled along caterpillar-style, elbows squeezed so tight to his sides that he'd been in danger of puncturing a lung, unable to rear his face more than inch away from Gajit's warty toes. Their emergence was a relief in more ways than one.

"Phew," Peter gasped, leaning on Gajit's shoulder as he staggered into the light. "Fresh air."

"Yeah," Gajit agreed, inhaling hungrily. "Putrefaction."

"What? I – oh."

They were standing in a shallow valley. At least, Peter assumed it was shallow – it was hard to tell, given that it was stuffed to the brim with garbage. "Ugh! What is this place? Is that – is that a _body_?"

"Dumping ground," said Gajit with indomitable cheer. She prodded Peter to stand without assistance and span around with her arms outstretched, encompassing the whole decrepit heap. There were soggy hillocks of discarded clothes, mountains of mulching out-of-date protein blocks. Rotten fruit cores. Seeping strings of fluid that Peter neither had the knowledge to nor wanted to identify. Burnt out relics of engine cores twisted into helter-skelters high above, and flies sawed in noisy tornadoes, fat bluebottles with bodies as large as Peter's clenched fist. "Everything winds up here at some point. Old food, old tech kibble, old friends…"

"The back of Knowhere's sofa?"

"You could say that. C'mon."

"Where are we going?" Peter asked, as Gajit started to swarm the nearest mushy pile. It was a dune of rusted metal and decomposing organic bits, and the whole thing shifted and slipped under Gajit's squirming toes, dragging her one step back for every two she took. "And why doesn't it smell?"

Because it _did_. But nowhere near as awful as it should, and Peter worried for a moment that cohabiting with Ravagers might have caused permanent damage to his nose.

"Most droids are assigned to one station," Gajit puffed. Dug in her fingers and heaved herself atop a solid hunk of old race pod, buried securely enough in the dune's flanks not to slide. "So if we grab a garbage drone that's dumping posh-looking trash, it'll fly us straight to the Nova Corps. And it don't stink because it's doused in solvents every hour. Trust me – we don't wanna be there when that happens."

Peter eyed up the rotten shale. Set a tentative boot onto what might once have been some sort of orange – it squelched obscenely, innards pulping out either side – and tried to decipher whether this was gross or kinda awesome. He settled for a bit of both. "Why not?" he asked. Dug the boot in – the fruit gave up its last congealed spurts, along with a few overzealous maggots – and started to climb. He made it five steps before his feet squished into something larger. He wriggled to extract it. Then, when that didn't work, glanced down – and choked on a scream, flailing so hard he tumbled all the way down again. He dragged the alien's too-soft torso with him, along with half the pile, and Gajit snickered nastily, surfing the buffets from atop her vantage.

"Where d'you think the bodies come from?"

* * *

Vaas hummed to herself as she slung the belt around her hips, holsters smacking her thighs. A few words slipped out, and one of Crab's guards – nursing his broken nose, courtesy of Kraglin – scrunched its buckled remnants in confusion. "Whassa _peena co-larder_?"

Vaas span her pistols around her fingers by the trigger guard. She slotted them neatly home. "Fuck if I know, but it's catchy. Now Crab – how many guys d'you think I oughta take? That kid's damn quick. Plus, Axley's a big fella, and y'know Kraggles can be… _slippery_."

"He's certainly proved that much," Crab grumbled.

Meanwhile, the guard was peering at the feeds behind her. "Uh, Vaas? Ma'am?"

"What? And it's 'captain'."

"It will be," Crab corrected, "once I have Udonta's head." Vaas was about to respond – something suitably sneery, because _experienced_ Crab might be but like hell was she gonna roll and show her belly; she'd be captain with or without his backing. Luckily for her, the broken-nosed guard took that moment to squeak his gloved finger off the vidscreen.

"Well, captain-ma'am; didya said somethin' bout a kid…?"

A scuttle cam's red-tinted reel showed a panoramic of the dumpsite. A dumpsite through which a junk-droid was ricocheting, careering into the pit's steep embankments and bashing headlong into piles of decomposing waste. It was a squat thing, shaped like a toadstool: a cheap conical engine riveted to a bulging grey semisphere, four arms attached under the canopy. Each was tipped with a clawlike litter-pick, and those litter-picks were currently groping at the two small children who were clinging to its back by their fingertips. The nearest child, around whose neck hung a very familiar pair of spongey orange headphones, was almost flung off when the junk droid made a violent turn and scraped along a rusty old race pod fast enough to draw sparks. His mouth opened in a soundless 'o'.

"Volume," said Vaas.

"- _aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaieee_ -"

"Nearly got it, nearly got it!" The second kid, an urchin of classic Knowhere stock whose matted black hair was a potential nest to lice, cockroaches, and multiple genera of rats, had wrested a panel off the droid's smooth flank. "Here!" She wrenched out two handfuls of wires, corresponding to the creatures' forelegs. They relaxed their pincering of Peter's ankle and drooped in wilted defeat. The girl crowed, using the wires as reins to spin the droid in a victory-lap. Besides her, Peter's shrieks became gleeful laughter. He stood – tentatively at first, but with growing confidence – and rode the droid like a surfboard, while his new friend straddled the shell and drove.

"Yee-hah!" he yelled. The zoom on the camera was clear enough that even through the swirling white fug of compost-steam, Vaas could read the elation on his face.

"C'mon ugly," the girl shouted, wrapping the makeshift reins around her fists. The droid bucked, one last time, as if in defiance. Then shuddered, and hovered still. "Don't mind us; go get on with your job…"

The droid's shell span on its axis, gyroscopic and greased-smooth. The alarm bulb flashing out from under the translucent case waned, and Vaas blinked at the shift in light: intermittent crimson to steady white. "Here we go," came the streetrat's whisper. There was a grating hum. Then the droid was off, zipping through the mouldering mountains with its cargo dragging on its reins every time it edged wallwards.

"How has he gotten that far?" Crab growled, smacking his guard on the paldron. As he was a hologram, it didn't have much effect. "You! Take Vaas and your team and track this Terran pest down!"

Vaas realized she was smiling, and put a stop to it. "Nah. Kraglin and Axley are in the Horde bay – I'm gonna go after the big fish. We shouldn't need more than a dozen men to snatch the Terran; even your guys ain't so incompetent they could be outsmarted by a twelve-year-old. Rest had better come with me."

Crab ignored the amendment of his order, although the slant to his brows suggested he wasn't too happy about it. "And what makes you think the Terran isn't flying to join them?"

"This." Vaas budged the guard on monitoring duty to one side, ignored her protests, and set to rewinding the scutte-cam feed with a circle of her thumb over the mirrored black interface. She froze it on a frame that captured the droid in mid-spin, the boys' legs flung outwards like rotary blades, and enhanced until the red-tinted numberplate was visible. "Look. Bay-99, that's a nostril designation. And y'know who sets up camp in Knowhere's nostrils…"

Crab's mouth closed tight enough to smooth out the wrinkles. "He's going to the Nova Corps."

* * *

How had this happened?

Seriously. One moment you were sucking off your captain: kinda getting into it, hips jerking under your palms and blue fingers knotting in your hair. The next your captain had a hole in his head and you were on the run from a terrifying sneery Hraxian, with another Hraxian – equally terrifying and even _more_ sneery, who also happened to be that captain's _regular_ sucker offer – dragging you into a Horde docking compound and claiming that this was the only way you all stayed alive.

 _Really_ , Axley thought, squeezing himself into the pilot's seat and, after a moment's deliberation, fastening the seatbelt. _I shoulda deserted when I had the chance_. He almost meant it too.

He'd propped Yondu in the co-pilot chair – it didn't seem right to let him roll about the floor like loose salvage. The Centaurian's head lolled forwards and he slumped as far as was possible over the straps pinning him upright. But his chest didn't cease in its slow rise and fall. Apparently, not everyone had to have their M-ships custom-scaled so they could buckle up and breathe at the same time. Axley took the chance to look his captain over, battening any squeamishness far down. He couldn't _see_ any blood. Just a load of that weird granular fluid from his broken implant, dribbling over Yondu's forehead like semi-molten lava. But the furrow seared into the top of his head bit deep. Axley didn't know how low the implant went, but those had to be some fairly vital brain-bits it was replacing – right? Surely Kraglin knew that. He had to. You didn't fuck your way to the top without learning _some_ of the boss's more intimate details. He had to realize how little hope there was.

But if Kraglin was determined to cart Yondu round like a lifesize novelty toy, it weren't Axley's place to argue. He'd just have to jump ship before Kragin tried to put him on nappy-duty.

Axley sighed and gingerly gripped the joysticks. One for flaps and one for thrust – just like an M-ship. He could do this. If only they weren't so _spindly_ …

In the chair besides him, Yondu yawned and opened his eyes. Then realized he was fastened to a stiff-backed chair, in a place he didn't know, potential enemies on all sides (one not a meter away, mumbling cusses to itself as it blundered through an unfamiliar ignition sequence) and whistled.

Nothing happened.

"…Captain?"

Yondu whistled again, straining against the belts as Axley slowly turned. Then he _hissed_ , fierce and feral, and made an admirable effort at clawing out his lower left eyeball.

"Woah! Hey – captain! Yondu, it's me; it's Axley –" Did he want to say 'I gave you a blowjob four nights ago'? He didn't want to say 'I gave you a blowjob four nights ago'. "You're okay," he finished lamely. There was a long pause. Yondu's lips relaxed from their purse, the piercing staccato notes breaking into silence. He nodded, pupils still pinpricks, and gradually settled back onto his seat, poncho ruckled and creased from where the seatbelt had dug in. Axley eyed the way he was breathing; still a bit fast and high. "Want me to, uh?" He gestured at the straps. And, receiving an affirmative grunt, reached over and banged the knob at the centre of the link, sending them zipping back to their crannies. "There. Okay, so some shit's gone down. Uh… Where to start…"

His fumbling explanation jarred off in a squeak as Yondu surged upright, leapfrogged the chairs, and dragged Axley flush against the headrest with a forearm over his throat.

"Who the fuck're you?" he growled into his ear. "And how d'you know my name?"

* * *

 **Me: I'm going to avoid** _ **these**_ **tired old fanfic clichés**

 **Also me: but as for** _ **this**_ **tired old fanfic cliché…**

 **Ssh. I like amnesia-fic. Although, there will be… a bit of a twist. You'll see. ;)**

 **Please leave comments! They motivate me like nothing else. x**


	11. Chapter 11

**In which Peter goes solo and Kraglin's in trouble (as usual).**

* * *

The junk droid wheeled to a halt above a discarded takeaway box. Peter figured that even on the other side of the galaxy, some things never changed.

Gajit tugged on the reins to keep their robot from moving once it had transferred the rubbish to the sack it held clutched in one of its remaining responsive pincers, which dragged out horizontal when they flew like a parachute on a drag racer. Her smile was fading, giddy delight replaced with solemn gravity. "This is where you get off, Petey."

"Huh?" Peter looked around, bewildered. "Here?"

'Here' was definitely not a Nova harbour. Here was a slender artery, too thin for the larger pilot-bearing junkships to bludgeon down. Every crack in the atrophied tissue was crusty with grime; every nook held a glass-eyed squatter. Some munched slowly on dried huffer-root, others watched the violet smoke curl from the mouths of their pipes, and others still tucked into the walls and bundled rags around their feet to stave off the surface corridors' lingering chill. There were bare-breasted bipedal women wearing glossy red heels – Peter ineffectually tried to convince himself not to peep – who swayed monstrously tall, their shadows writhing eldritch-like under the flickering neon lights. Creatures of all anatomical description staggered from a dingy bar entrance ahead, and the splatter of their vomit was audible even over the bellow of drunken shanty songs.

Peter swallowed. "Uh, I'm not sure," he began.

Gajit released her reins to give Peter's back a friendly thump. "Can't take ya right up to the ships, can I? Not if you're gonna sneak aboard. Defeat the object."

"…Right." Not that he was _nervous_ , about fending for himself. Just that… Well, what with Kraglin and Yondu dead and the Ravagers turned enemy, _alone_ was a pretty big feeling right now. He dithered on the precipice of the junk droid's shell. The ground below was knobbled and gnarly, slimy with the dregs of alien booze, and that two metre drop might as well have been lightyears.

"Geddon with it before I push ya," Gajit grumbled. The hand on his back became warning, and Peter swallowed and let himself slither over the edge. His boots slammed down, legs buckling – but he caught himself on hands and knees rather than knees and chin, which was a small victory. Overhead Gajit whistled toothlessly to herself as she veered the old junk droid around. Clearly, she intended on whizzing away and leaving him to his fate without so much as a by-your-leave; Peter supposed that was the way it went in the big wide universe, for Ravagers and streetkids alike – getting attached or getting sentimental were synonymous with getting dead. But heck. Gajit had been good to him. Even if she was marooning him in this sinkhole, Peter figured he owed her something.

"Wait! Can I… can I give you money, or anything?" Because he did have some; just a little. Yondu maintained that Peter was too small to be paid proper (which was all kinds of stupid because Peter didn't eat as much as a big person, so really, shouldn't Yondu pay him _more?_ ) But he'd still barter over a pittance of a salary, given in exchange for bogs well-scrubbed. When Peter caught him in a rare good mood he could walk away with full pockets.

Pockets which were assuredly not full now. Peter turned them inside out in growing horror. "Uh…"

"Oh yeah," said Gajit breezily, reclining on the junk droid's back and kicking filthy feet at the ceiling. "I picked ya for everything I had before we hit the tunnels. Been nice meeting you, Petey. Hup, boy!" And with a wave and a putter from the straining engine, she was gone.

Peter gawped after her. He was streaked in Knowhere-snot and garbage-grease, sweat and grime and the dried salty remnants of tears. He was exhausted, body and brain, and more than a little afraid. And possibly – just possibly – there was a small part of him curled up right now because _yeah_ Peter was alive though. That was something. And he'd never have made it without Gajit. "Thank you!" he called to the empty tunnel, meaning the words to the depths of his empty pockets. Then he turned and began the uphill push through the floundering drunks, eyes on the eerie blue gleam of docklights ahead.

* * *

Kraglin swung through the fighter's access hatch, talking as he went. "You'd best be ready to gun 'em, Ax; won't take the engies long to realize, and with those big brains of theirs they'll probably put the cannons to rights in moments. We gotta… go… now…" His voice trailed off, as his vision focussed on the gun barrel squashing his nose. "Um."

"How's about you shut up and get on the floor," growled Yondu.

* * *

Peter entered the docking bay at a jog, not least because a couple of the less stable drunks had tried to grab him as he went past.

"S'it Xandarian?" one said.

"Looks _tasty_ ," said another, and Peter had had to kick him in the knee to get him to stop squeezing his bicep like he was pinching for edible fat. He remembered how eager he'd been to sample a portion of adulthood when Vaas brought him his first drink – now, the sour boozy stink on their breath made him shudder.

She'd tricked him. Of course she had. Taken advantage of the stupid little Terran…

Peter slowed to a trot, then a leisurely stroll. Focussed on his breathing until he was counting to four for every inhale and five for every ex. Set his jaw, smiled at anyone who looked at him, and walked like he was meant to be there. He couldn't afford to be a stupid little Terran. Not now.

There'd be no Yondu coming to his rescue anymore. Nobody knew him out here, and even less folks cared – Gajit had gotten him as far as she could, but Peter had to do this last part himself. And so he kept smiling and he kept walking, meandering back and forth between the little dockside kiosks that sprung up wherever a crew settled, dawdling around a stall of what smelt like hotdogs but looked like toffee apples and feeling more miffed than he'd pretended that Gajit had swanned off with all his cash. Hopefully he'd be able to stow away in a Nova ship pantry. Only it didn't look like many of the star-shaped crafts sprinkling this corner of Knowhere's nostril membrane would fit a kitchen cupboard, let alone anything more substantial.

Peter scrunched his face, mulling this latest dilemma. He'd have to get inside the actual cockpit – these miniature fighters weren't like the M-ships, which varied from solo vessels to crafts with ample space for a crew of five, if by 'ample' you meant elbows in each other's faces and arguing over who used the bathroom longest. All were much of a likeness, shaped like the jacks Peter used to play knucklebones with in the school playground, with one seat and one control column and not much else besides. The only variable factor was the amount of golden paint scuffed off their wings. Evidently, there was a larger ship designed for deepspace travel hovering around Knowhere's aerial-puckered cranium. But if he planned on getting there, it would only be in one of these miniature speeders, in full view of its pilot.

Not for the first time, Peter mentally berated Yondu for not letting him drive his M-ship when he had the chance. That was a _much_ more useful Ravager-skill than toilet cleaning, anyway. If Yondu's ghost was still hovering around somewhere – which Peter wouldn't put past the stubborn git – he hoped he was realizing the error of his ways. But standing in mute half-conversation with a dead man was half as crazy as hearing the dead man talk back, so Peter stopped his mind before it could wander any further and focussed on the task ahead.

Hijack a Nova ship. Easy, right?

* * *

"What d'you mean, _you're hijacking the ship?_ Ya can't hijack the ship we're rescuing you with!"

His outburst earned him a rap of the pistol between the eyes – _ow_ – and a close-up of Yondu's snarl. And – well shit. He hadn't noticed that there was a difference between when the death threats were mock and when they were real, but right now his bladder was informing him that the change was significant.

"I told ya to get on the ground. Last. Chance."

He meant it. Kraglin stared at him a second longer, trying to penetrate the cold red of Yondu's glare and find something familiar beneath – but only for a second. He nodded, and dropped to his knees. "Pistols out," said Yondu, gesturing with the gun. Kraglin obeyed. His hands shook as they undid the strap and deposited his whole arms belt by Yondu's feet – with its lone occupant and his last clip of plasma-juice inside. Because yeah, Yondu made him roll his eyes and occasionally wager with himself whether he was going to see the end of the day with as many limbs as he'd had when he'd started it. But being _afraid of Yondu himself_ , as opposed to just his stupider plans, was something else entirely.

Yondu kept the guns steady on him and Axley as he kicked the belt out of reach. His expression was shut off, hostile to a fault, projecting nothing but suspicion and anger. Which probably meant he was freaking out too, what with having woken up without any recollections of the past few years, if his lack of recognition was anything to go by. Kraglin tried to imagine what that must be like. Strange place, strange people… Heck, the only thing he'd be likely to recognize would be the Horde ship's interior.

Which didn't bode well for them.

Kraglin's throat dried as Yondu stepped over his legs, shooting Axley a look when he readjusted in his seat that had him shrinking behind it. "We ain't Horde," he whispered. Yondu stopped when they were both in his sights, the pistol grinding on the back of Kraglin's skull. Kraglin raised his empty palms and struggled to dampen their quiver. There was a knife in his sleeve – a dozen more stowed under the poncho, in danger of rattling if he didn't get himself under control. It was probably best if Yondu didn't know about them. "We're Ravagers, captain. Your men."

Yondu confirmed his suspicions as to how much time he'd lost. His confused grunt was repaired to a growl. "I ain't _captain_ ; don't you go sweet-talkin' –"

"You ain't captain _yet_. Look, ya took a headshot – damn nasty one too. Why don't you have a feel, and –"

"I can _feel_ ," spat Yondu, "that some fucker's done broke my link with my arrow. And I'm thinkin' right now, that fucker's most likely you."

Aw shit. Kraglin shut his eyes. Tried to focus on something else besides the icy circle of steel stamping into his cranium. "It might just be outta range," he said, tongue scraping on the arid roof of his mouth. "Didn't hang round to grab it while I was dragging you out."

"He's telling the truth," added Axley, rather pointlessly. Then flinched hard enough to smack his forehead on the overhead ejector seat pulley as Yondu fired a warning shot into the chairback. Kraglin's hands jumped towards his ears of their own accord, but resumed their proper place at a prod from the other gun. Horde weapons – must've been lying around somewhere. But fine-tuned while they might be, they weren't silent, and if this kept up much longer someone was gonna _notice_ …

"Please," Kraglin said, as smoke drifted from the singed cushion in a languid spiral and Axley's eyes set up a terrified quadruple twitch. The rim of the cockpit doorway was digging into his knees. "Please, we have to get out of here. Even if you _hijack_ us, or whatever – we gotta go. And soon. Otherwise we'll all be dead."

"Nah," said Yondu. "Just you." And he pulled the pistol back a little ways, readying to fire.

Kraglin forgot how to breathe.

He didn't, however, forget how to fight. He threw himself sideways and rolled as hard as he could, smacking Yondu's shins and sending the plasma blast smashing into the blinking polka dots of switches and lights crowding the spacecraft's cabin ceiling. Hopefully none of them were too vital for their hasty getaway.

"Boss! Yondu! Ya _really_ don't wanna do this –"

Yondu snarled, knocked off balance, but kneed him in the jaw before he went down. Kraglin reeled away, teeth chomping tongue. He sprayed blood in his face when Yondu crunched up and aimed to shoot him between his spread knees.

"Guys –" Axley started, then had to duck another wild blast. "Okay. I'll shut up."

"No, you'll _help me_ –" Kraglin's voice cut out as Yondu pushed fluidly to his feet and stomped on his stomach before he could twist away, grabbing the doorframe for leverage. The partition sliced his kidneys. "Ah!" Or something to that effect. It was rather more breathless, and threatened to be followed by his lunch. Yondu grimly ground his heel down. Kraglin squirmed and writhed like a slug under a salt-shaker, and Yondu's pistols tracked the thrash of his head the whole way.

"Ain't nobody helping you," he said. The liquefied crystal leaking from his forehead mingled with Kraglin's mouthful of blood, a slick and fluid gel that striped Yondu's blue cheeks like warpaint. His eyes were utterly devoid of mercy, and the lack of recognition there hurt almost as much as the plasma bolt would.

Well. Kraglin couldn't say that conclusively – he'd never been shot in the head, and Yondu wasn't sharing stories.

He forced his eyes open. If Yondu was gonna kill him, Kraglin was gonna make damn sure that he glared at him the whole time. Hopefully burnt an image of himself into the jackass's retinas so that when his brainpan came swinging back to the present he'd feel an ounce of guilt.

This meant he got to watch in perfect clarity, as Yondu's aim wavered. His face crumpled to confusion and pain for a split second – he almost brought up the pistol-bearing hand to touch his temple – and then reformed around shock and wonder. The guns dropped. Literally. One right on Kraglin's face – but that blow was nothing compared to the blaze of a plasma bolt, and Kraglin relished the throb of the new bruise.

Not dead yet.

But… why?

Yondu removed his foot from his belly, staring at the boot like he'd never seen it before. Then curiously blinked at his own hands – big and broad but lacking those gnarly gun callouses that made Kraglin's palms so rough to the touch – and twisted to examine the seam of the poncho that ran up to his neck.

"Uh," said Kraglin, sitting up. He held his guts, just in case they were gonna come sliding out. "Captain? You okay?"

Yondu's head tilted towards him, and even before the questioning clicks began Kraglin knew he hadn't understood a word.

* * *

 **Wuh woah, what's going on now?**

 **Please review! I desperately need writing motivation at the moment. T.T**


	12. Competition!

**Not really a chapter...**

Hey guys! I've done a thorough edit and uploaded Blame It On The Stars as part of the fanfic competition over on Inkitt. The link is

www DOT inkitt DOT com / stories / 44107

(Obviously with actual dots instead of words, and spaces taken out!) If that doesn't work, you can just type 'Blame It On The Stars' into the search bar, and it'll come up. ;) Anyway, if you liked this story, please please please go give it a vote!

I think you might have to get an account? It's perfectly free, and you can sign in with fb/twitter - but I'd be sooooo grateful if anyone could help me out. xxx

(New Peter&TheWolves chapter will be up soon, too! Term's nearly over~ :cheers:)


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